Kathmandu. With the ban on the import of vegetables from India, the produce of local farmers in Nepalgunj has started getting market. Local farmers have started getting satisfactory prices due to the restrictions imposed on the import of vegetables at a time when Nepali products are not able to compete with vegetables imported from India.

With the halt in the import of vegetables from India, farmers from Banke and Bardiya districts throng the Surkhet Road at Dhambojhi of Nepalgunj in the early hours of the morning to buy vegetables.

According to Motisara Thapa Chhetri, chairperson of the Ranitalau Agricultural Produce Market Board of Directors in Nepalgunj, vegetables produced by farmers in Banke district have got market in Nepalgunj after the customs imposed strict customs on vegetables.

Currently, vegetables produced in Banke district are being supplied to the Ranitalo vegetable market in Nepalgunj. The provision of customs duty on vegetables imported from India has given market to the domestic agricultural products.

Traders have reduced the import of vegetables from India as it would be costlier to import vegetables from India. At the vegetable market of Nepalgunj, farmers from Hiraminiya of Duduwa Rural Municipality-6, Balegaun of Nepalgunj-14, Dhodegaun of Janaki Rural Municipality and Khajura Rural Municipality of Banke district have been selling their agricultural produce.

Thapa Chhetri said that vegetables from Salyan, Surkhet and Bardiya are also supplied to the market at wholesale rates. According to him, the vegetable market of Nepalgunj is supported by the commercially produced agricultural products like cauliflower, cabbage, bottle gourd, cucumber, beans, tomato and chillies produced commercially by the farmers of Banke.

Jalaluddin Bagwan, a farmer of Puraina village in Nepalgunj Sub-Metropolitan City-21, said he was getting good price for his vegetables after the import of vegetables from India was stopped.

This year, the Indian tremors were also displaced due to the cultivation of watermelons on the banks of the Rapti River. Consumer rights activist Prabhat Kumar Thakuri said that consumers are attracted towards organic and local products in the market.