Food grain production drops

Food grain production drops
The Himalayan, 12-May-10

Due to drop in food grain production, over a million Nepalis are under the shadow of famine this year. Nepal is experiencing food shortage of 3,16,465 metric tonnes (MT) affecting over 1.6 million people this year, Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperative (MoAC) said today. Food deficit was around 1, 32,914 MT last year.

According to MoAC, food grains — rice, wheat, maize, millet and barley — production has decreased by 4.3 per cent to 7.76 million MT this year. Total food grains production was 8.11 million MT last year. Area of cultivation is also contracted by one per cent this year. Irregular monsoon and insufficient irrigation are blamed for the low production.

Production of rice — major crop in Nepal — has decreased by 11 per cent to 4.02 million MT this year, MoAC said. Nepali farmers had produced around 4.52 million MT of rice last year. Second major crop — maize — production has also declined by four per cent contracting the total production from last year’s 1.93 million MT to 1.85 million MT this year.

However, production of three crops — wheat, millet and barley — cultivated in summer has gone up. Barley production has jumped by 19 per cent followed by wheat (up by 16 per cent) and millet (up by two per cent). The ministry has assumed around 1.55 million MT wheat, 3,00,000 MT millet and 27,500 MT barley production this year. Last year, the quantity was 1.34 million MT, 2,93,000 MT and 23,000 MT respectively. MoAC has also identified six factors — irregular monsoon, poor irrigation facility, unavailability of fertiliser in cultivation season, shortage of hybrid seeds, settlement in cultivation areas and low investment in research and development — for low food production.

The ministry has expressed grave concern in irrespective growth of population to food production. “Gap between food production and population growth is widening and has created an alarming situation for food security,” it said.


NFC to buy 25,000 MT rice

Ministry of Commerce and Supply (MoCS) has directed Nepal Food Corporation (NFC) to buy 25,000 metric tonnes of rice from India to mitigate the impact of food shortage. The ministry has on Tuesday asked NFC to present purchase plan as soon as possible. “We are working on action plan,” said Hari Narayan Shah, general manager of NFC. “Details of the plan will be ready by next week. Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal had asked Indian government to provide 2,00,000 MT of food grains to Nepal from Indian state entities during his New Delhi visit. Following the request, Indian government had approved supply of 50,000 MT of wheat and 25,000 MT of rice in the market price for Nepal for 2010.

An Impending Food Emergency in Nepal

Less food, more mouths to feed
NepaliTimes, Issue #463 (07-Aug-09 to 13-Aug-09)
KUNDA DIXIT

New report warns of an impending food emergency in Nepal

Nepal suffers chronic food shortage, but a convergence of crises has created a food emergency which could have serious political repercussions in the coming year.

An apocalyptic new report by the UN's World Food Programme (WFP) warns of a "sharp and sustained decline" in food production in Nepal. Even if only some of WFP's predictions come true, food shortages could trigger widespread social unrest.

'The Cost of Coping: A Collision of Crises' adds up the cost of the global fuel, food and economic crises and how these are magnified by a stagnation in Nepal's food production, growing population and political instability. In addition, a cycle of droughts and floods has pushed an already vulnerable population to the edge of famine.

As a result, 3.4 million Nepalis don't have enough to eat. An additional five million Nepalis have fallen below the poverty line in the past three years: forcing them to take children out of school, east seed stock or sell land.

'If current production growth rates remain constant?it is likely that within the next 3-5 years Nepal will become food deficit at a national level even during years of normal harvest,' warns the report.

There are more mouths to feed, but Nepal's rice production actually fell by one percent between 2002-2007, while harvests increased by 16 percent in Bangladesh and 31 percent in India. Nepal's investment in agriculture fell from 30 percent of the budget to 5 percent in 2008, and even so only 16.5 percent of the allocated money was spent.

"The three aspects of food security: production, availability and affordability, and we have to respond to each," says Yubaraj Khatiwada, the newly-appointed head of the National Planning Comission.

The winter drought in 2006-7 was followed by another eight-month drought last winter and then a bad monsoon this summer. This may lead to a food grain deficit of more than 200,000 tons because winter harvests in the mountains came down by half and even the Tarai may suffer huge rice harvest shortfalls this summer.

But at the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives (MoAC), spokesman Hari Dahal says the WFP report is "alarmist". He admits the food deficit has affected 700,000 people, and adds: "I haven't heard anyone dying of hunger. there is no shortage."

But even the MoAC's own figures point to a harvest shortfall. This needs urgent investment in agricultural infrastructure and subsidies for inputs. New technologies for dryland rice like the System for Rice Intensification (SRI) need to be promoted. (See box, below) All this needs the political will to grasp Nepal's food emergency and do something about it.

Sixty percent of children under five in the mountains are undernourished: one of the worst figures in the world. Nepal is now even more unlikely to achieve the UN's goal of eradicating extreme poverty and hunger by 2015.

The government needs more effective distribution of subsidised grain to hotspots, expansion of food for work programs like the ones implemented by WFP, and school meals for vulnerable children.

The WFP report concludes with this dire warning: 'If urgent action is not taken to address Nepal's food crisis, then the situation will deterioirate further through this decade and the next?urgent prioritisation of national food security is required at the highest level of the Nepal government and supporting development partners.'

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Food crisis looms large

WFP unveils plan to feed 2.5m in Nepal

WFP unveils plan to feed 2.5m in Nepal
eKantipur, 15-Aug-08

The World Food Program (WFP)-Nepal announced plans on Friday to expand operations to feed 2.5 million people who are of late struggling with the compounded effects of high food prices, decade-long conflict and drought.

The UN food agency in a statement said approximately half of those in need would be covered under the WFP’s existing program targeting 1.2 million people struggling to recover from conflict, an onslaught of natural disasters and the additional burden of high food prices.

Under the expanded operation, an additional 1.3 million will receive food assistance, and a minimum of 31 districts will be covered.

“In a country where more than 40 percent of the people are undernourished, millions of people are already living under constant threat of hunger. We have already seen how rising food and fuel prices have forced families to reduce the amount of food they consume - putting them at risk of malnutrition,” WFP country representative Richard Ragan said in the statement.

WFP-Nepal said it has recently received from Saudi Arabia a US$ 6 million contribution, announced earlier this week as part of the WFP’s package to assist 16 “hunger hotspots” across the world including Nepal.

“The contribution from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will help us to rapidly scale up to feed Nepal’s hungry, but we still need an additional US$ 70 million to reach the 2.5 million Nepalis who are becoming hungrier everyday as food prices continue to rise,” stated Ragan.

Nepal relies heavily on imports from its neighbors, primarily India, for essential commodities, including food and fuel. “Frequent strikes by transport syndicates disrupt the flow of commodities, causing localized food shortages and further increasing food prices,” the statement added.

Other major donors to the WFP’s operation to provide food assistance to vulnerable people affected by high food prices and conflict include the United States, the UN Central Emergency Revolving Fund, the Netherlands and Germany.

The world’s largest humanitarian agency has planned to feed around 90 million people in 80 countries.