Orange sale worth one and a half crore from Rakhugaon in Myagdi

Myagdi. Farmers of Beni Municipality-3, Bhakimli Rakhugaon of Myagdi have managed to bring in more than one and a half million rupees in the village by selling oranges. This year, overall production of oranges in the district has decreased. A single farmer of Rakhugaon has earned between 5 lakh and 9 lakh by selling oranges. Rakhu's Mankumari Pun said that oranges worth nine lakhs were sold this year. She has been producing orange plants by establishing a nursery for the last one and a half decades. Pun, the leading farmer, said that this year, she sold oranges directly from the plant to traders from other districts. Khim Pun, another leading farmer, informed that 65 households in Lower and Upper Rakhu, which are famous for orange production in the district, have grown oranges worth about one and a half million this year. The farmers of that village have produced at least 30 thousand to 9 lakh oranges. Khim Pun, who is also the coordinator of the Orange Zone program, informed that the income has increased because the new plants have also produced fruit this year. “Though the production has decreased, the income has not decreased, the farmers engaged in orange farming have earned millions in their backyards,” he said. Pun, a farmer who is going to purchase oranges from Rakhu and grade them on the road of Surkemela and send them to Kathmandu, said that farmers also got a fair price when the traders competed in the purchase of oranges from Rakhu area, which produces the most oranges in the district. He informed that the oranges here have been purchased from the plants by Kathmandu traders this year. In Rakhu, Kul Bahadur Garbuja, Jashikala Roka, Bhimkumari Gharti, Khirmati Rana, Tha Bahadur Pun, Jas Bahadur Gharti Magar and others have grown more than seven lakh oranges and the number of farmers who earn more than four lakh by selling oranges is increasing every year. Rajendra Roka and Man Bahadur Budhathoki of Rakhu, who have abandoned traditional farming and are now cultivating commercial oranges, have added new plants this year. Ward president Padam Pun said that since orange cultivation has changed the standard of living of the farmers, more orange trees have been planted throughout the village since last year. He said that farmers are active in the expansion of orange cultivation under their own leadership as well as the distribution of new plants every year, encouragement from various agencies including the Agricultural Knowledge Center. Traders have come to the village with big trucks to buy oranges. Since they started coming from far away, the road has also been organized. After the cultivation of oranges started to generate cash income rather than food crops, Rakhu locals were attracted towards orange cultivation, and now, along with the barren land, even the backyards are full of orange plants.