Pasang Norbu Tamang was just a little boy when he saw white people for the first time in Langtang valley. They were a small group of people taller than anyone he had ever seen and as white as the radishes he had been pulling out of the ground all day. He wondered what they were doing in a place like Kyanjin which had no houses except for a gumba (monastery), few monks, lots of radish fields and some yak herders’ sheds looking after the hundreds of yaks grazing in the pasture.
Unlike the villagers, he was more curious than afraid of the white people and would observe them doing their work while cutting the radishes and laying them out to dry in the sun. The radishes had dried by the time the white people left the valley and he eagerly awaited his father’s arrival with the yaks, knowing they would be well fed in the winter.
After the end of the Rana regime in 1951, Nepal opened its doors to the world. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization sent the Swiss Nepal Forward Team, which included Swiss geologist Dr. Toni Hagen, to survey the agricultural potential in the Himalayas in Nepal.
Among the team’s recommendations was the export of excess yak milk produced in the Langtang Valley. This idea was forwarded to Swiss cheesemaker Werner Schulthess, known as “The Milkman” within Kathmandu’s expat community. Schulthess proposed turning the surplus yak milk into alpine-style hard cheese to prevent spoilage during the seven-days it took to trek from Langtang to Kathmandu.In the winter of 1952, the necessary machinery and tools were brought in, and by the summer of 1953, Nepal’s first dairy factory, the Kyanjin Cheese Production Centre, was established.
Protect Interests of Domestic Farmers
The project, however, faced challenges. Yak herders were initially reluctant to sell their milk and did not enjoy the taste of cheese. Schulthess sought the help of the Lama of the gumba, who persuaded the herders to sell their excess milk. He solved the second problem by distributing free samples to the villagers until they grew fond of cheese. Over time, the factory became a success, and yak cheese from Langtang gained popularity among both locals and tourists in Kathmandu.
Pasang Norbu witnessed the cheese factory’s journey from its inception to its peak, when it processed over 600 liters of yak milk daily. In many ways, he grew up alongside the factory, starting as a “cheese boy” running errands, and gradually learning the cheese production process until he became a skilled cheesemaker. He could have managed the factory himself had he been literate. His son, Gyalbu Tamang, also followed his path, drawn to yak herding, milking the yaks, and spending all his time in the pastures. When Gyalbu was twelve, his older sister came to the pasture, took him out of the shed, and enrolled him in the third grade at a school in Dhunche, with no resistance from Pasang Norbu. Gyalbu went on to study up to the eighth grade.
Tourism gradually began to overtake pastoralism as the primary source of livelihood in the Langtang Valley, following the establishment of Langtang National Park in 1976—the first protected area in Nepal’s Himalayan belt. By the turn of the century, the grazing area of Kyanjin pasture transformed into a trekking town, with numerous tea houses being constructed. The winter snow that once made Kyanjin uninhabitable had drastically decreased by the 2000s, leading to the establishment of even more tea houses for tourists, as Kyanjin became the last stop on the classic Langtang Valley Trek. The radish fields that once thrived in the area disappeared as pasture evolved into a bustling tourist town. As tourism proved to be more profitable and less strenuous than yak herding, the number of yak herders gradually began to decline.
Gyalbu’s last memory of his father was of him scolding him for drinking since morning, a habit that had developed over time, on that fateful April day in 2015. After his retirement, Pasang Norbu had used his retirement money to purchase 15 yaks, starting a new life of grazing yaks and selling milk to the factory. Gyalbu had started working in the factory, quickly rising through the ranks from “cheese boy” to cheesemaker and eventually becoming in-charge of the factory. He witnessed the heydays of high cheese production gradually decline due to the diminishing number of yak herders, which adversely affected milk collection.
The number of yak herders had already decreased from 43 to fewer than 30, and when 22 herders were killed in the earthquake, fewer than 10 remained. Gyalbu discovered his father’s body buried under avalanche debris alongside his yaks in the village of Thangsyap near Langtang. A significant number of yaks were killed, and many of the deceased herders’ yaks turned wild. The gradual decline in yak milk production was dramatically accelerated by the earthquake.
As the in-charge of the factory, Gyalbu played a significant role in the reconstruction of the cheese factory, which was funded by the Swiss Government. However, the real damage had already been done, as most of the herders were either dead or had shifted to the tourism business. The entire valley was in the process of rebuilding their lives, with new houses made of concrete featuring multiple floors for guest rooms. This marked a new beginning for the valley, now fully focused on tourism.
The construction of the Kyanjin hydroelectric plant, utilizing water from the Lirung Glacial Lake, three years after the earthquake, brought electricity, modern appliances, and luxury to the people of Langtang. The new generation recognized tourism as a more viable source of livelihood, and as families began to earn money, they sent their children to study in the cities, making yak herding increasingly unviable for the younger population.
Currently, there are only five active yak herders, each with about 20 yaks. The population of wild yaks has increased, outnumbering domesticated ones. The milk collection of 600 litres daily has now reduced to less than 100. The herders are reluctant to sell their milk to the factory because hotel owners pay double the price—Rs 200 per liter compared to the factory’s rate of 105 rupees. Selling three thermoses of tea has become more profitable than selling yak milk daily. The cheese produced in the factory has not been exported to Kathmandu for over five years as it is only sufficient to sell to tourists and local guesthouses. With time, the herders will only get fewer and with no new ones replacing them, the future of pastoralism and the production of yak cheese looks very bleak.