The District Food Security Committee has declared a food crisis in these VDCs.[break]
This year, crop production in the district has been very low owing to delayed monsoon. Farmers in these VDCs depend on rainfall as they have no proper irrigation facilities. Even in the years when monsoon is timely and adequate, locals manage to produce crops barely enough for six months. But this year, crop produce sufficed for just three months, leading to the crisis.
A majority of residents of these VDCs are Dalits and indigenous nationalities who are into faming.
Lajim Oli, a local, said people are depending on potato to fight hunger. They eat one potato a day with either a chapatti or a little porridge, Oli said. Many families are planning to shift base elsewhere.
According to Mahesh Pariyar, a teacher at Syamkhadi, the only option is to trek for two days and buy rice at the Radijyula market.
Locals pay a heavy price for rice in the market as the Food Corporation has not reopened up stores at Radijyula and Rukumkot. The corporation´s stores were relocated from these places to the district headquarters during the insurgency.
The corporation ideally needs 25,000 quintals of rice to provide for the whole district. But it has a stock of 11,000 quintals only.
The corporation´s Rukum office has asked the government to provide an additional 7,000 quintals for the famine-hit VDCs and another 7,000 quintals for the rest of the district. But the supplies have not reached the district so far.
Prem Narayan Bhandari, chief of the office said the whole district is food insecure, though the 10 VDCs are the worst hit.
“The famine has struck despite the food for work programs run in the district by many NGOs,” said Bhandari.
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