KATHMANDU, Jan 26: The Ministry of Land Management, Agriculture and Cooperative (MoLMAC) of Province 1 in association with the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) on Tuesday officially launched Phase-2 of the Nepal Agricultural Market Development Programme (NAMDP).
The NAMDP Phase-2, also known as Sahaj, is an SDC project, implemented by a consortium of Swisscontact (as the lead agency) and the Center for Environmental and Agricultural Policy Research, Extension and Development (CEAPRED). The four-year project which started in December 2020 will be assisting in the financial and technical support for services and innovation for agri-businesses in the province.
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During the launching event held in Biratnagar, the participants pointed out the need for focusing on growth and investment in forward market linkages, strengthening the country’s commercialization, processing and export of value-added agriculture products.
Ram Bahadur Magar, the Minister of State for MoLMAC of Province 1, said there are plenty of agricultural commodities with export potential in the province and the project will have a crucial role in the commercialization of the agricultural products to aid in export promotion.
SDC’s Programme Manager Coralie Blunier said the second phase will focus on strengthening forward market linkages and expanding segments of vegetables, maize, cardamom and dairy value chains. “This phase is expected to unlock the potential small and medium agri-businesses in Province 1 to be innovative, to grow and increase the production and trade of quality value added products in the domestic and international markets,” she said.
Rick van der Kamp, team leader of NAMDP Phase-2, said the programme is designed to foster overall agriculture commercialization of Nepal.
