According to Sushil Gyawali, chairman of Nepal Briquette Association (NBA), sale of briquette has gone up because it is a reliable alternative source of energy in the current situation where supply of fossil fuels is declining. He further added briquette is cheap and easy to handle. [break]
"Last year, around 200,000 pieces of briquette were sold while this year it has doubled and around 400,000 pieces have been sold till date," said Gyawali.
Briquettes are mostly used for room heating, baby massage, cooking meal, boiling water and even barbeque. "Briquette can be prepared from the all types of woody and leafy biomass including pine needles and agriculture residues. It does not cause any harm to health and can be used for daily household purpose," Gyawali told Republica.
Briquette can be easily found in leading department stores and costs Rs 80 per packet consisting of 3 pieces. "Demand for briquette increases mainly in winter because it is used for room heating and baby massage purposes," said Meena Nepal, sales executive at Bhat-Bhateni Supermarket at Koteshwor. She further added the sale of briquette has gone up compared to last year.
"Large number of customers who were using electric and gas heaters earlier switched over to briquette because it comes across as the best option to beat cold during power-cuts," said Nepal. She also disclosed that nowadays around 100 packets of briquette is being sold daily from the store but with the end of winter, demand for briquette goes down.
However, in the off-season also, briquettes are used mainly for warming new-born child and mother. Briquettes are manufactured mainly in Chitwan, Argakhanchi, Jhapa and Morang districts. There are seven factories manufacturing briquettes in Nepal. Briquette manufactures say as the government has not yet provided Quality Assurance/ Quality Control QA/QC, the market of briquettes is not expanding.
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