Following the success of Bangladesh Government-to-Government (GTG) agreement to import chemical fertilizers, the government has taken the initiative to import fertilizers from five other countries through the same process. According to the Ministry of Agriculture, the process of importing manure from India has reached the final stage. At the same time, letters have been sent to China, Bangladesh and Morocco at the government level. A letter was sent through Ministry of Foreign only a week ago and no response has been received from those countries.
Dr. Hari Bahadur KC, Joint Secretary at the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock Development, said that the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock Development has sent letter to those countries through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs after the Council of Ministers gave in-principle agreement to purchase manure from these four countries.
He said that GTG has already brought manure from Bangladesh and all that remains is to sign the agreement with India after completing all the procedures. In the meantime, the process has been started with four different countries. Stating that this process has been started as an emergency to end the annual shortage of manure in the country. He said that all the work has been started through global tender.
Even when Ghanshyam Bhusal was the Minister of Agriculture, the process of purchasing manure through GTG was started with Bangladesh, India, China, Oman, Morocco and Russia. However, Netra Bhandari, head of the Agricultural Ingredients Company Limited, said that they were able to import only from Bangladesh. According to Gorkhapatra Online, manure has already been brought from Bangladesh and the process is underway with India.
China, Oman and Morocco did not pay at that time and the process has been resumed, he said. Tenders are being cancelled time and time again. As the tender is being cancelled, there is an acute shortage of manure in Nepal, so manure is being brought through GTG as an emergency.
At Agricultural Ingredients Company currently has a stock of 9,000 metric tons of urea. This manure is enough for planting paddy. After that, the government started managing the manure after seeing the possibility of some problem in the manure required for paddy.
By Muna Chand
