Farmers in despair over loss of yield

BANKE: Many farmers, who lost their paddy yield to this week’s devastating unseasonal rainfall — the worst in recent times — fear starvation in the coming days.

Bhum Prasad Oli of Khoria, a resident of Kanchanpur, is devastated. He has to take care of as many as nine children. “What shall I eat in coming year? How do I feed my nine children?” he laments in utter disbelief.

Oli had toiled very hard this summer to cultivate paddy in his 16 katthas of land. But when the plants were on the verge of fruition, Mother nature unleashed her fury, leaving it flattened to the ground.

“The nature played havoc with my fate. I don’t know how to make both ends meet,” he said. Oli is not the only farmer, who had lost his source of livelihood. Tikalal Chaudhari, too,

is on the same rocking boat. Farmers in Benauna, Baijapur, Phattepur, Samsherjung, among others, echo similar concern: How do we survive

in the days ahead?

Buddhi Chaudhari, a resident of Baijapur-1, too, lived to tell a heart-wrenching tale. His produce was destroyed just ahead of the harvest

season. Baijapur VDC is the epicentre of the calamity. Hundreds of hectares of paddy are now submerged under flood and muddy water.

Nepal Red Cross, Bardiya, is compiling the extent of the loss in Rajapur, Khairi Chandanpur, Suryapatuwa, and Thakurdwar VDCs.

Officials at the District Agriculture Office (DAO), Banke, said that the damage had been colossal.

Dhan Bahadur Pun, DAO, Banke said that the agriculture produce would sharply decline this year.