Nepal’s Agricultural Economy: The SWOT Analysis

 

Nepal is a mountainous country with more than 80% covered by mountains, with agriculture as the main areas of income. Nepal’s main agricultural area is the Terai belt with plain wide-open fields. Though the mountainous areas also do produce agricultural products but 80% of food products go as the food. There are various complications in the industry wide production in the mountainous regions. The Himalayan regions have very less cultivable lands and those land area get covered in snow almost all the year. The production is even too low for the local consumption. Most of the Himalayan regions have to import foods from other parts of the country and most of the people get deprived of food during the winter seasons. The hilly areas are less accessible with the latest technologies and ideas to produce the cash crops, which could be exported in return of cash. The tea, coffee, paper, honey, ginger etc. are mostly being produced in the hilly areas. Now a trend is coming up the fields of organic farming. About ninety percent of the organic farms are being run in the hilly areas. 

 As per the recent international reports, Nepal is sixth top producer of lentils. This is a huge achievement and we can focus such products, which could put us into the world agricultural map and the buyers could get attracted towards our country. Nepalese tea and coffee are very good, they also do have good markets in Nepal and most of the south Asian people but due to the lack of proper planning and market strategies these products are being over shadowed. Most of the people are unaware of what they could produce better in their locality. They have no idea about the actual ways of producing agricultural products. They are just following the good old traditional agricultural pattern of producing the same three products all around the year. There are various organizations for the agricultural product development, working here in Nepal, but most of them are in the Name-sake only and they only focus on collecting funds  rather than real service. 

Lets figure out the SWOT analysis of Nepalese agricultural sector:

STRENGTH (S):

As mentioned above the main producer of food and cash crops of Nepal is the Terai region. There are various parts of the country that have proper irrigation system and road access. The farmers could produce the crops by using modern means such as harvester, cultivators, and modern processing equipment, which could help to save man hours and speedy return of the products. The products could get ruined due to weather condition and other factors but they could get a better result with these equipment. Most of the Terai belt people do survive on farming. But the might not know the proper ideas of farming. They should have proper access for the modern day trends and ideas. The best crops of Terai regions are sugarcanes, lentils, ginger, mangoes, melons, rice, wheat, etc. Not only that the tea, coffee and honey products of hilly areas should also be promoted. There should be proper crop storage sectors in each and every areas. The mountainous regions have proper weather and climatic condition of vegetable products but most of them get ruined in absence of proper storage facility.

WEAKNESS (W):

With the political instability and with the absence of proper plans and policies the agricultural sectors are totally affected. There are no proper rules for the usage of the types of chemical fertilizers in the lack of proper guidance there is a crisis of fertilizers every time. The farmers have to pay huge sum for the subsidized fertilizers imported from the donor countries. There is also the lack of proper guidance and training in the agricultural production. The farmers have no idea about their farm condition. Most of them don’t care about it and the rest have no intension to change their production. Our main weakness is the lack of proper education for the farmers. The government has no plans to work on the agricultural products. It has plans but most of the plans are paper based. Most of the young generation doesn’t care about agriculture. They are more towards the technological advancement and most of them have targets to go abroad and study over there and eventually get settled over there. Thus the modern young generation should be promoted to come over to the agricultural sectors. They would be able to study much about the modern day trend of agriculture and could use them in the agricultural sectors.

OPPORTUNITY (O):

The big O in SWOT analysis is the opportunity. There are huge opportunities in the agricultural sectors. The new trend shows that the people are more aware of the aftermath of the chemical products. Most of the people’s immune power has been totally ruined by the chemical foods and fast food. So these days the people are more attracted towards the organic food. This could be another breakthrough in the agricultural production. Most of the young people are attracted towards this farming. Some of the farmers have gained proper knowledge about organic farming from abroad and in the country. The products are a bit expensive but they could go down with the increment in organic farms. Not only the vegetable products the people are more attracted towards the modern day fisheries. Most of the fisheries are able to produce in huge quantity all around the year. Big hotels and resorts around the country are consuming most of the fish products. The fisheries are also turning into one of the recreational facility for the city dwellers and the tourists. Most of the trout fisheries at around Kakani, which is just an hour drive away from the capital city, stay full all around the year. The trouts are turning into one of the items in the Non–Veg menu. These days we have been importing meat products from abroad. So, if we could focus on the meat production there is also a huge opportunity in this sector. The dairy, goat farming and fisheries could be another areas where we should not depend on the imports. During Dashain, Nepalese consumes millions of money value of meat. This could be save in the country if we could produce meat products in huge quantity. Not only that, the rice products are also one of the best sectors in agriculture, it is the base in Nepalese food menu.

THREATS (T):

With the modern day expansion of industrialization and settlement plans, most of the cultivable lands are being covered either by factories or by housing plans. The concrete jungles are spreading at a huge pace. Most of the farmers see for the huge money attached their land rather than they could produce. The land areas are lucrative areas for the big business houses. They either construct the housing settlements for the ever increasing population or the factories. There are no proper rules for these sorts of the non-agricultural use of the cultivable land. The industrialists are still able to lobby out the government to make the land usable for their purpose. The farmers are more attracted the easy money from their lands. Not only that most of the landlords don’t care about the use of their lands. Not only that the deforestation is still helpful in the low production of agricultural products. Due to the deforestation the climatic changes are inevitable and there are changes in the rain patterns and the crops get ruined on or off the fields. The farmers just don’t realize the real cause and after effects and keep on doing whatever they have been doing.  Not only that the global warming and the new sorts of agricultural diseases, the production is going down.

Nepal is not that poor in terms of agriculture, if we could use our resources. We just need proper planning and policies for the development of agricultural sectors. There should be proper learning facility for the farmers and the industrialist should be encouraged to invest in the agricultural sectors rather and the agents of global warming. The most important part is that, the government should be able to identity it as the main sector of earning for the country. This is just a simple overview of the SWOT analysis on the agricultural sector of Nepal. We can go way deep into the agriculture and we could get a better return for the country. We need young generation in the field of agriculture in Nepal, which is the main challenge in this modern day Nepal.