January 1: The local government of Ichchhakamana rural municipality in Chitwan is organising a three-day orange festival starting from today with the objective of ensuring market for oranges produced in the local unit’s villages including Tokdand, Dhap, Majhgaun, Sirangaun and Dode. These villages are famed for producing a large quantity of oranges.

Chairperson of Ichchhakamana Rural Municipality, Dan Bahadur Gurung, shared that the orange festival is being organised for the first time with the objective of ensuring market for oranges produced by the local farmers and its promotion.    
"We have made arrangements for the visitors of the festival to pick and eat oranges by climbing the tree," he added. Similarly, the local government informed that the festival also includes an orange eating contest.    
Chair Gurung said that the visitors can buy oranges at a discounted price compared to market during the festival. He added that the orange farmers will be distributed different materials and a training would also be imparted to farmers by agriculture technicians.    

"We are organising the festival with a belief that it will be easy to sell oranges produced in Ichchhakamana rural municipality at different markets of the country. We are also hopeful that it will help in the publicity of tourism sites of the area," he mentioned.    
It is estimated that more than 450 farmers of Ichchhamana rural municipality would sell orange worth Rs 100 million this year.    
Farmers are now selling orange at Rs 75-90 per kg from their farms. Orange is cultivated on 80 hectares of land in the rural municipality this year, according to the Agriculture Development Section of the rural municipality.    

A total of 1650 metric tonnes of orange was produced in the rural municipality last year. -- RSS