Nepal to earmark $81m for agriculture
Friday, 19 September 2008
KATHMANDU, Sept. 18 (Xinhua): The Nepali government has proposed to earmark around 6 billion Nepali rupees (some 81 million U.S. dollars) for the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives for the current fiscal year, most of which will be spent on 42 major projects.
The budget allocation is a big jump from last year's figure of 4.17 billion rupees (some 56.3 million dollars).
According to Thursday's The Kathmandu Post daily, the proposed budget has focused on research on bird flu, steps to deal with possible food crisis in the country, increasing the productivity of crops and providing incentives to farmers.
The government has proposed spending more than 430 million rupees (some 5.6 million dollars) on efforts to contain bird flu and carry out surveillance and epidemiological research on the disease, a source at the ministry was quoted by the daily as saying.
"We will also establish a high security laboratory in Kathmandu to conduct international level tests on bird flu," the source told the daily.
Samples will be sent to Australia for further tests, he said.
The government is setting up a fund of 60 million rupees (some 810,810 dollars) to compensate farmers in case their chickens have to be destroyed to prevent avian influenza from spreading.
The government is launching the Community Livestock Development Project worth 400 million rupees (some 5.4 million dollars) in 22 districts to increase the number of skilled human resources and set up and upgrade 112 cattle markets and 62 meat shops.
The budget allocation is a big jump from last year's figure of 4.17 billion rupees (some 56.3 million dollars).
According to Thursday's The Kathmandu Post daily, the proposed budget has focused on research on bird flu, steps to deal with possible food crisis in the country, increasing the productivity of crops and providing incentives to farmers.
The government has proposed spending more than 430 million rupees (some 5.6 million dollars) on efforts to contain bird flu and carry out surveillance and epidemiological research on the disease, a source at the ministry was quoted by the daily as saying.
"We will also establish a high security laboratory in Kathmandu to conduct international level tests on bird flu," the source told the daily.
Samples will be sent to Australia for further tests, he said.
The government is setting up a fund of 60 million rupees (some 810,810 dollars) to compensate farmers in case their chickens have to be destroyed to prevent avian influenza from spreading.
The government is launching the Community Livestock Development Project worth 400 million rupees (some 5.4 million dollars) in 22 districts to increase the number of skilled human resources and set up and upgrade 112 cattle markets and 62 meat shops.