February 12: The All Nepal Peasants' Federation (ANPF) has demanded the government to ensure market for the domestic agricultural products by fixing fair value for the products at the earliest.    
The government should be sensitive towards making the issue of agriculture and guarantee food sovereignty, argued the farmers. According to the federation, the farmers must have decent opportunity to generate income and employment in this field and the government must play a supporting role.

The federation argued that the farmers are drowning in debt without fair value of their produce and the lack of market, while the middlepersons are taking advantage of the situation.

The federation’s President Balaram Baskota made such a remark at a press conference organised on Friday.    
Stating that a majority of Nepali people are engaged in agriculture on which the country's economy is based, he said, "Agriculture is taking a back seat due to failure to protect agricultural produces. On the other hand, farmers are struggling without fair price of their products."    
For the development of agriculture, it is main responsibility of the state to provide fertilisers and seeds in time and provide market for the products, he underscored.    
Stating that people's right to food sovereignty that was established through Nepali farmers' movements are connected to farmers' prosperity and agricultural transformation, the federation’s General Secretary Pramesh Pokharel viewed that the government should be serious about farmers' protest. “The farmers must be saved from the interference of the foreign products,” he said.
The federation has drawn the attention of the government to resolve problems of fertilisers, seeds and irrigation while expressing sorrow over the incidents in which the farmers had thrown away their agricultural produce in protest. --  RSS