SOLUKHUMBU: Locals of the remote Forche village in Khumjung VDC-9 of Solukhumbu district are forced to buy a kilogramme of iodised salt at Rs 180.

They use normal breed of Sona Masuri rice, the cost of which hovers around Rs 240 to Rs 250 per kilogramme. The price they have to pay equals ten times more than in Kathmandu, said Forche’s local Ang Chiring Sherpa.

The essential commodities are brought to Salleri, the district headquarters, by trucks and then transported to Syanboche by helicopter and then carried to Forche by porters. Apart from choppers, the commodities are alternatively brought to Syanboche loading on mules.

Most of the families in Forche live on earnings from mountain expeditions. The village only produces potatoes and buckwheat, and the male members head to climb mountains or work as porters for foreign climbers to the base camps.

Pasang Nuru Sherpa, who has successfully climbed Mt Everest five times, shared that almost all the families have porters who head to the mountains. The Forche village which is known as the lap of Himalaya, comprises 85 families.

The village with its pristine beauty has unforgiving drawbacks and hardships. Many men are forced to run their families for a year reliant on Rs 300,000 that they earn by climbing mountains once a year. This is the earning of those who reach the peak of the summits, but for those returning from the base camps, it is even much less.