11/12/2020

SMALLHOLDER FARMERS COLLECTIVELY START VALUE CHAIN ACTIVITIES IN THEIR VILLAGE IN NEPAL

There is a famous saying “Time is money!”. This is simple yet thoughtful statement which suggests that an initiative that is quick and at the same time superior in quality can bring great profits, while slower-moving enterprise will suffer. Related to the above saying, some interesting stories regarding value chain activities are coming from the community of Dhobadi, Nawalparasi, Nepal.

One of the SAFBIN groups here has identified the practice of including one or more activity of cleaning, grading and sorting of cucumber just before selling to the traders of nearby cities (some wholesalers of Butwal and Narayanghat). The activity of cleaning, sorting and packaging in crates may be a low cost one, but the activity adds much of the value at the end. Due to this added activity they are getting a higher price for larger and cleaner cucumbers as compared to smaller and low grade cucumbers.

Previously the price of Cucumber was highly volatile and mostly been fixed by the traders. But now, the farmers of the group have been able to bargain as per the quality of cucumber the have produced. We can say that the bargaining power of farmers has also increased. On a daily basis, close to around 300 kg to 320 Kg of cucumbers have been marketed by the group for an average price of Rs 80/Kg.

In this regards, SAFBIN has been involved in facilitating the group for convergence for better access to production technology by farmers. The commercial vegetable Plastic tunnel and mulching plastic for off season production of Cucumber have been accessed from Local government. Not only with the support of Inputs, the group has received support for irrigation-boring and maintenance of irrigation channel.