Agro-career dream come true

Published On: September 7, 2018 02:09 PM NPT By: Tikaswari Rai


Nepal’s economy still depends highly on agriculture. According to the Ministry of Agriculture Land Management and Cooperatives, 66% of the total population in Nepal depends on agriculture. Agro economy contributes about 33% to the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

 However, only few youths have opted for an agro business and take it to the next level. Similarly, parents also desire their children to opt for different professions and skills other than the agriculture.

There are some instances where people have no confidence to take up agriculture as an entrepreneurial startup and view agriculture as a substandard profession. The Incumbent government had introduced Agriculture Development Strategy (ADS) with the aim of spending Rs.501.8 billion in 10 years during its earlier stint.

ADS is a 20-year-long vision document planned by the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock Development which came into operation from the fiscal year 2016-17. The main goal of ADS is to promote agricultural entrepreneurship and to encourage high value crops and market products.

Poverty alleviation is a primary objective of ADS with an aim to reducing rural poverty to below 10 percent among others. The Ministry of Agricultural Development has planned to spend 89 percent of the total amount from the government and development partners and the rest from the private sector and farmers.

ADS aims at expanding irrigation facilities to up to 80 per cent of arable land, expands access of farmers to agriculture programmes, increases agriculture gross domestic product growth to more than six per cent, and increases the annual export of agricultural products to 690 million USD among others, until the concluding year of ADS implementation. ADS has been prepared with the assistance from 13 development partners. Naresh Devkota, born and brought up in a wealthy family in Sindhuli district has a different take on agricultural sector.

Devkota, who studied at a college in Kathmandu, has worked at a Non-Government Organization (NGO) for more than a decade but he was not satisfied with his job with an NGO. Thus, he returned to his home town Sindhuli. He had a desire to work for a modern agricultural sector rather than working in someone’s organization. For his desire to start up his own agro farming, he has rejected an offer to work overseas. “I wanted to be an inspiration for youths planning to go abroad in search of employment by proving that agriculture can be a good option for employment,” shares Devkota.

Success does not take a rest rather it helps explore new avenues, which precisely applies to Devkota’s career. He did not limit himself to it only but also explored his skills and expanded his business into banana farming and started in a Bigha of land near his house.

He further said that after requesting and convincing his parents, he managed to get agriculture loan of Rs17,000 from Kamala Mai Corporative and began his journey into agriculture. “After few months, I decided to extend the business to poultry farming and built chicken coops near my house and started poultry farming which has now been a successful venture. Following this success, I saw the market for meat shops and opened it at Dhungrebas and started selling frozen meat for two years,” shares Devkota.

 According to him, after working for two years, Devkota switched his career to vegetable farming, which he found very lucrative. With successful ventures in both the agriculture and vegetable farming, he decided to extend his business to agro vet business. “Then I started Siddhababa Dana Challa Suppliers Institute in 2006 and promoted my business. I enjoy my work and there is no looking back. I am very satisfied with my achievements today. I feel glad that I have been able to set an example in agro business to inspire today’s youths,” he shares. Success does not take a rest rather it helps explore new avenues, which precisely applies to Devkota’s career. He did not limit himself to it only but also explored his skills and expanded his business into banana farming and started in a Bigha of land near his house.

He was the first ever to start commercial banana farming in his area. He stressed the importance of techno-friendly farms rather than traditional method. He suggests, “Now we need a modern technology to till the field instead of depending on oxen. We must prioritize agro economy and reap benefits from agro farming.” At present, he has 11,000 chickens at his poultry farm and is also involved in goat husbandry as well.

He has interest in all agriculture-related fields and vows that he keeps exploring avenues as an agriculture entrepreneur. The Nepal government has also appreciated Devkota’s ideas and concept. The government had also honored Devkota with the “Best Agriculturist Award 2017” under the category of Commercial Farming and Trade Project.

Project for Agriculture Commercialization and Trade (PACT) under the government has been operating 10.8 million rupees Sub-project in collaboration with the Siddhababa Dana Challa Suppliers. PACT has given three million rupees in assistance and the remaining 70 percent amount is managed by the suppliers itself. Under the Sub-project, the suppliers is held accountable for producing high quality feed and marketing it.

According data maintained by the Department of Foreign Employment, as many as 36,063 youths had gone overseas from mid-July to mid-August in search of jobs. Among them, 33,360 were male while 2,703 were female. Despite having tight policy of the government, 1, 258 individuals managed to get work permit through individual channels. Likewise, a total of 15,239 workers got permission for their desired countries under the re-entry category.

Qatar is a destination for most of them that receives 12,882 migrant workers followed by United Arab Emirates (UAE), 8,526. However, under individual category also 495 left for UAE followed by Qatar 380. In previous months nearly, 50,000 youths used to leave the country for foreign employment on a monthly basis.


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