February 16: In terms of production, wheat is the third major food crop of Nepal. Data suggest that the area of cultivation of wheat is decreasing every year. According to the government data, the area of wheat farming in Nepal has decreased by 51,300 hectares in the last seven years.

The main reason for the decline in the area of wheat production is the recurrent loss and the process of harvesting wheat is complicated than other crops. Uddhav Adhikari, the coordinator of the Agriculture for Food Campaign recalls that wheat farming is perceived to generate loss ever since he has known.

Adhikari said, “In the past, farmers had no other option and were forced to cultivate wheat despite the loss. Currently, farmers have other options that give profit in a short period of time. Due to this there is a lot of distraction in wheat production.

“It is difficult to extract grain form the plant. Threshing machines have not reached the hill areas yet. Since it is a winter crop, it is not possible to arrange irrigation in time. Farmers also have to suffer from lack of advanced varieties of seeds and fertilizers. Due to this, the area of land where wheat is produced has not expanded,” said Adhikari.

According to the data provided by the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock Development, wheat was cultivated in a total of 762,373 hectares of land in Nepal in the fiscal year (2071/72). In that year, 1,975,625 metric tons of wheat was produced. By the year 2077/78, the production area decreased by 51,306 hectares to 711,067 hectares. While on the other hand, production seems to have increased to 2,127,267 metric tons.

According to the data of the year 2077/78, cultivation of paddy occupies 50.56 percent of the total cultivable land, corn 26.96 percent and wheat 19.13 percent. Although it is the third major crop in terms of production, due to the decrease in the area where wheat is grown, Nepal is forced to import wheat worth billions of rupees every year.

According to the data of the Department of Customs, 191,000 metric tons of wheat worth more than Rs 6.32 billion was imported in Nepal last year, mostly from India. As per the information, current wheat production in Nepal is sufficient to meet the domestic consumption needs while the imported wheat is used for industrial purposes.

Ram Krishna Regmi, head of the Statistics Branch of the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock Development said that due to the fragmentation of the land, the cultivable area is decreasing and the farmers' attraction towards wheat farming is decreasing due to the lack of profit in accordance with the cost of production. Also, due the tradition of eating rice for every meal in Nepal, there is more attraction towards paddy cultivation and less attraction towards wheat cultivation.

The coordinator of the campaign says that the government should initiate special initiatives to increase wheat production. According to him, if the government moves towards providing higher subsidies for wheat, expanding the wheat pocket area, increasing the easy access to equipment and providing universal access to fertilizers and advanced varieties of seeds, farmers can be attracted to wheat farming.