Government fix sugarcane price at Rs 401 per quintal

The agitating sugarcane farmers called off their strike today after the government agreed to fix a minimum price.
A meeting in the Valley today afternoon in the office of care taker Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal has fixed the price of sugarcane at Rs 401 per quintal.
According to Federation of Sugarcane Producers Farmers chairman Kapil Muni Mainali the strike was called off after the price was fixed.
The meeting has also agreed to set a Sugarcane Development Board.
The sugarcane farmers have been agitating after the industries declined to hike the price of sugarcane and forced them to sell sugarcane in low price. They were demanding Rs 421 per quintal, while the industries had agreed to pay not more than Rs 330 per quintal this year.
Last year‚ the government had fixed the rate of sugarcane price up to Rs 570 per quintal from a minimum of Rs 421.
Earlier, the administration had also clamped curfew in 13-km range of the East-West highway in Sarlahi after the farmers obstructed the highway to pressurise the government to fulfil their demands.
Sugarcane farming accounts for 70‚000 hectors of land in seventeen districts in the Terai region. Nepali market consumes 1.5 million tonne sugar per year but the domestic sugarcane is enough to produce only one million tonne, according to the farmers.
Every year, the country has been facing sugar shortage in the festival seasons pushing the price up. However, this year, the price has not seen whopping rise -- due to easy availability -- in price unlike last year.
According to the central bank, the price indices of sugar and sweets increased by 28.8 per cent in the first four months of the current fiscal year against an increase of 50.3 per cent in the same period last year.
The sugarcane farmers have been blaming the government for not being interested in addressing their problems, though the caretaker Prime Minister Nepal had directed the secretaries of Ministry of Finance‚ Agriculture and Cooperatives and Ministry of Industry to create an environment of consensus and fix price with agitating sugarcane farmers.