June 25: The farmers of Morang are excited after the price of pre-monsoon paddy doubled this year compared to last year. The pre-monsoon paddy, which was priced at Rs 550 to 600 last year, is being traded at Rs 1,000 to 1,250 this year.

Bhagirath Ghimire of Morang’s Belbari-11 said that he was excited when the traders began to give good prices for the pre-monsoon paddy, which is planted in the spring season and harvested in June. "In the previous years, pre-monsoon paddy did not even cover the farmers’ production cost, but this year we got an unexpected price," he said.

The Koshi provincial government has decided to give an incentive of Rs 500 for producing pre-monsoon paddy per kathha (0.031 acre) of land. But many farmers said that they were not aware of this facility. Deepen Rai of Belbari-11, who planted pre-monsoon paddy on one bigha (0.625 acre) of land, said that the farmers would be relieved to get this facility.

Ramdev Singh, head of the Agriculture Knowledge Centre, Biratnagar, said that out of 111,000 hectares of cultivable land in Morang, pre-monsoon paddy is harvested in only 21,900 hectares while 83,300 hectares is used for the traditional monsoon paddy plantation.

He said that the district produces 5.5 metric tons of rice per hectare.

Due to the lack of fair price, the farmers' attraction towards pre-monsoon paddy was decreasing, but this year's price has increased the farmers' attraction towards the pre-monsoon paddy.

Pre-monsoon paddy is cultivated even in winter with the help of irrigation facility.