by Ramesh Kumar Paudel in The Kathmandu Post, July 16, 2023
At 10 am on Saturday, 10 trucks were queued at a road near Hakim Chowk in Bharatpur. Senior government officials, including Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister Narayan Kaji Shrestha, Minister for Agriculture and Livestock Development Beduram Bhusal, and Secretary of Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Supply Madhu Marasini had reached the Chitwan district to bid farewell to the trucks.
Chinese Ambassador to Nepal Chen Song also joined the Nepali leaders and government representatives to bid farewell to the caravan of the vehicle.
The trucks that were loaded with eight metric tonnes of haylage headed north from Bharatpur. The trucks will transport the goods up to the Nepal-China border point, from where the Chinese side will pick it up and take it to Shigatse. The leaders and top bureaucrats reached the southern town to officially inaugurate the supply as this is the first consignment of its kind from Nepal to the northern neighbour.
To prepare haylage, green maize and other nutritious grasses are first cut into small pieces, wrapped with air proofing and stored for at least 130 days. Nepal Horizon International Pvt Ltd, a company run with Chinese investment, has been producing haylage in a plant at Prembasti of Bharatpur Metropolitan City-5 to export it to China.
According to Zhang Jinxiang, CEO of Nepal Horizon International Pvt Ltd, the plant which was established three years ago can produce 60,000 tonnes of haylage a year. “We have already produced 3,000 tonnes of it. We dispatched only 82 metric tonnes in the first batch in view of possible hindrances on the roads due to rains,” said Zhang.
The Nepali trucks will carry the goods up to the border point at Keirung. The Chinese side will collect it from there. Chinese people use haylage to feed yaks. According to Zhang, around a million metric tonnes is the demand in the market of Shigatse alone. One metric ton of haylage can fetch up to Rs24,000 in the Chinese market, he added.
The Chinese company buys green maize plants produced by farmers in Bharatpur and Ratnanagar areas. Zhang said they offer up to Rs6,000 for maize plants produced in a kattha of land and the price is fixed based on the quality of the plants. “Now we are buying maize from the farmers, but we are planning to lease an area for the purpose or deploy farmers in the maize production on our own,” he said. “Later, we will also use napier grass for the purpose.”
He said they coordinate with ward units and other local authorities while fixing the prices and taking other decisions. They are also planning to export other agrarian goods as well.
Nepal and China had signed the agreement to export haylage to China during the visit of erstwhile Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on March 26, 2022.
“At present, one million hectares of arable land is lying barren. Nepali farmers can produce grasses in the area once they can earn money from that,” said Bhusal, the agriculture minister. “It also helps reduce the trade deficit of Nepal.”
Meanwhile, Chinese Ambassador Chen said in a tweet on Saturday, “According to the exporting company’s prediction, the potential of haylage exports is promising and the annual exports will fetch Rs4 billion, which will double Nepal’s total export volume to China.”
https://kathmandupost.com/money/2023/07/16/nepal-exports-first-batch-of-haylage-to-china
