According to NFWA president Narayan Dhital, they had supplied 500 tons of fruits in a week even during the last days of Dashain.
“As the demand of fruits soars significantly during Tihar, we have planned to increase our supply up to 1200 tons for the five-day festival this time,” he said.
As majority of the people celebrate Tihar in the capital itself, the consumption of fruits soars more than twice compared to Dashain. [break]
Bhawani Shankar Chaulagain, one of the traders at Kuleshar fruit market, said, “We are set to double our supply targeting Tihar.”
Dhital said that as apple production has improved in India this year, consumers will not have to face shortage of apples during Tihar.
Low production of apple in India had caused shortage in Nepal last year. “And there is no reason to hike the fruit price this Tihar. However, if any problem occurs in the supply chain, we may have to raise the price accordingly”, he told Republica. According to him, the supply of Chinese apple has gone down this year due to price hike as Nepali currency has weakened against the Chinese Yen lately.
As told by Dhital, only 30 percent of the total fruit quantity is supplied from within the country while the rest is imported from India and China.
Orange and banana are the major fruits that are produced in Nepal.
Oranges are mainly supplied from Gorkha, Syangja and Dhading while bananas are produced in Chitwan, Jhapa, Sunsari and Morang.
As the country is not self sufficient on these fruits, huge quantity of oranges and bananas are imported from Nagpur and Bihar of India, respectively.
Dhital said that apples comprise around 30 percent of the total fruit consumption during Tihar. Bananas share 20 percent of the total consumption followed by orange, pomegranate, sweet orange and other fruits.
Similarly, according to the data provided by NFWA, 80 percent of the total of imported fruits comes from India and the remaining 20 percent from China.
However, during the festive season, China supplies more fruits to Nepal because the supply of Indian apples declines as its consumption increases in India during Diwali, the Indian version of Tihar.
China is also the major source of pears supply during Tihar.
India, however, remains the major supplier of orange, sweet orange, apple, pomegranate, papaya, pineapple and others fruits.
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