Nepal is currently in the midst of multiple overlapping crises and challenges. The exceptionally heavy monsoon rains have taken a terrible toll, 101 people have died and a further 53 are missing. Coronavirus cases continue to emerge, 18,374 positive cases have now been recorded, with a total of 44 deaths. Lockdown restrictions are easing slowly, but the economic fallout promises to be severe. An emerging, fourth, challenge is developing in the south of the country on the Terai, but it is one that The Glacier Trust is playing a role in easing.
Keshab Rai, Deusa AFRC’s manager distributes fruit trees to farmers in Solukhumbu, July 2020
Terai or Tarai roughly translates as “the low-lying land, plain” it is not the landscape one typically thinks of when one thinks of Nepal. It is, however, one of Nepal’s most important regions. The Terai is almost pan flat and extends west to east right across Nepal between the Indian border and the first foothills of the Himalayas. It is Nepal’s bread basket, we know it well from our visits to Kawasoti, where our NGO partner HICODEF are headquartered.
Floods and non-stop rain are having a ravaging effect on Nepal’s agriculture, particularly on the Terai. The same rains and floods are also effecting India, where the crops Nepal usually imports are now in very short supply. The effect of all this is steep price rise for basic vegetables, as The Kathmandu Post reports:
According to traders, vegetable prices have swelled by 25-110 percent. The wholesale price of tomato, potato, onion, cabbage local, cauliflower local, eggplant, cowpea long, French bean long and hybrid, soybean green, pointed gourd local, snake gourd, smooth gourd, sponge gourd and okra has soared by up to 105 percent over the week.
Nepal, of course is already trying to cope with the economic fallout of the Coronavirus lockdown, the last thing people need is a hike in the price of basic food. However, some families and districts will cope better than others with this situation.
Food security at a national, local and household level is key. This is why training in growing a diversity of organic crops is at the heart of both our climate change adaptation and COVID-19 response programmes. Through our partnerships with EcoHimal Nepal and HICODEF, we are enabling families to grow a wider and wider range of climate resilient crops.
This means they have access to the food they need to feed their families a healthy balanced diet, but it also means they can sell surplus at local markets. This helps to keep the prices down for those who would otherwise be forced to raid already stretched savings to buy over-priced fruits, vegetables and other staples (that is if they can get their hands on them at all)
In Solukhumbu, the Deusa Agro Forestry Resource Centre (AFRC) is a hub for training farmers in how to grow new crops in kitchen gardens. The AFRC also grows and distributes the seedlings to farmers need to grow their own. TGT has played an important role in making this happen, all thanks to donations from our supporters.
It was incredibly encouraging to receive photos and news from Deusa this month. Staff there have been distributing seedlings to farmers from the upper slopes of Deusa; farmers we’d not previously reached. The photo’s featured here were sent to us from staff at Deusa AFRC, they show farmers collecting their seedlings, it is a beautiful and hopeful sight; this is what enabling adaptation and resilience is all about.
