October 31: According to government data, 1.2 million tons of fruits are produced annually in Nepal. The data provided by the National Fruit Development Center shows that 1.2 million tons of fruits were produced in 1.19 thousand hectares of productive land in different parts of Nepal in the fiscal year 2020/2021.

The data prepared by the center takes into account the main fruits produced in Nepal including apple, pear, orange, banana, mango, and papaya. According to the data, the fruits produced in the review year was the most in the last 11 years. Similarly, the lowest production was in the year 2010/11, with just 794,000 tons of fruit produced in 79,000 hectares of productive land. 

Even though productivity is improving every year, Nepal has not yet become self-sufficient in fruits. In the year 2018/19, the productivity per hectare was 9.73 tons. This situation is improving and in the year 2021/22, the productivity per hectare has reached 10.50 per cent. In the same year, Nepal imported 280,000 tons of fruits. According to the data of the center, 372 tons of fruits were exported in the year 2020/2021.

According to the center's study, fruit cultivation is done in 4.79 per cent of the 3.391 thousand hectares of arable land in Nepal. Similarly, out of about 23 per cent contribution of the agriculture sector to Nepal's gross domestic product, 7.04 per cent is from fruit production.

The government has declared the period between 2016/17 to 2025/26 as the Fruit Decade in order to make the country self-sufficient in major fruits within this period by expanding the fruit business and promoting exports.

Although various programs have been launched to make the fruit decade successful, large quantities of fruits are being imported every year.

According to Yam Kumari Shrestha, information officer of the center, due to the lack of quality seeds, trained and skilled technicians and suitable markets and prices, fruit farmers have not been able to become self-sufficient in fruit production.

Amar Baniyan, president of Nepal Fruit Wholesale Business Association Kathmandu, informed that apples worth Rs 30 million and bananas worth Rs 40 million were imported from India and China only for the Tihar festival. Similarly, oranges worth Rs 50 million and coconuts worth Rs 20 million have been imported, he said.

According to Shrestha, fruits of different types worth Rs 72 million were imported into the fruit market of Kuleshwar for Tihar alone. Experts say that in some cases, the market price of foreign fruits is higher than that of domestic ones, so Nepali producers have become discouraged.