May 17: The Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock Development has proposed giving continuity to the old programme related to the agricultural sector in the upcoming fiscal year’s budget. It is has been learnt that the ministry has decided to give continuity to most of the old programmes which fall under in the main priority of the agriculture and livestock development sector for the budget of the upcoming fiscal year.

Most of the programmes proposed for the upcoming budget are old ones including the continuation of the data collection system, expansion and continuation of farmer listing programme, implementation of seed distribution and management guidelines, implementation of minimum support price, construction of warehouse for storage, expansion and continuity of digital soil mapping programme, extension and continuity of agriculture and livestock insurance programme, national agriculture etc. Although this is not the final proposal, the Ministry of Finance prepares the budget based on this proposal.

Spokesperson of the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock Development, Prakash Kumar Sanjel, said that most of the old programmes have been getting continuity in the budget of the agriculture sector every year. He added that the ministry will focus on the implementation of the old programme rather than adding new programmes as the budget sealing for the coming fiscal year will be the similar as that of last year. He said that the ministry will play a role in facilitating the implementation of policies and standards.

Concerned authorities of the agricultural sector on the other hand, are not satisfied with the ministry's proposal of old programmes. They expressed that new programmes that can be implemented easily have not been added because the government lacks vision. Uddhav Adhikari, coordinator of the Agriculture Campaign for Food, complained that the government still has not paid attention towards the issue of increasing imports of agricultural commodities every year. He said that the focus should be on increasing production rather than keeping the old programmes in the budget.

“The government has set a goal to increase production. However, the model of increasing production is outdated. The government well knows that the production cannot be increased with the prevailing model. Despite this, the government has not paid attention to it,” said Adhikari.

The government seems to have always failed to address the problems faced by the farmers. Stakeholders complained that the government failed to provide proper relief to the farmers affected by the natural calamities. Other problems faced by the farmers include mismanagement of fertilizers, seeds, distribution system and untimely allocation of support prices. Due to this, the number of people engaged in agriculture is decreasing every year.