Morang. In terms of rice production, Morang district, which is considered to be the best in the country, has seen a decrease in rice production this year due to unseasonal rains. Compared to last year, the production of paddy has decreased by 2 thousand 84 metric tons this year. According to Deepa Dev, the head of the Agricultural Knowledge Center in Morang, it has been estimated that the production has decreased due to the unseasonal rain in the second week of October. According to him, last year 339 thousand 3.45 metric tons of paddy was produced in the district, but this year 336 thousand 919.41 metric tons of rice was produced. Last year 4.88 metric tons of paddy was produced per hectare, but this year only 4.85 metric tons per hectare was produced. This year, paddy cultivation was done in an area of ​​69,467.92 hectares in the district.

Agronomist Rajendra Upreti has speculated that due to the increase in silting up of the canals around the arable land, due to the inability to drain the water, there may be more damage to the ripe rice and the production may have decreased. He said that although the paddy production was good this year, unseasonal rains affected the harvest time.

Birendra Khatri, a farmer of Belbari-11 Bhangbari, has said that about 90 maunds of paddy planted in about six bigha of land have been damaged due to unseasonal rain. Khatri says that the farmers should be worried as the price has also fallen along with the loss of rice.

According to Khatri, the market price of paddy this year has ranged from Rs 1,200 to Rs 1,300. Last year in December, the market price of paddy traded between Rs 1700 and Rs 1800.