Paddy production in Nepal is expected to fall by 4.2% in the current fiscal year 2025/26, the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock Development said on Sunday, January 18.
The harvest is projected to drop to 5.70 million metric tonnes this fiscal, down from a record 5.95 million metric tonnes in FY 2024/25. Productivity is also expected to dip by 1.16 percent, from 4.19 metric tonnes per hectare to 4.14 metric tonnes per hectare in the same period, the ministry said in a statement.
The ministry attributed the fall primarily to reduced transplantation. Migration from hilly regions and increasing out-migration of youth for foreign employment have limited available farm labour, while many farmers are shifting to fruit and cash crops, added the statement.
Paddy was cultivated on 1.37 million hectares of land this fiscal, compared to 1.42 million hectares in FY 2024/25, marking a 3.8% decline. In the Tarai and urban regions, industrial expansion and infrastructure projects have further reduced area under paddy cultivation. Drought during the transplanting period in Madhesh Province also hampered production.
Despite the adequate availability of improved seeds and fertilisers, unfavourable weather conditions affected productivity, the ministry noted.
The estimates were derived from provincial agriculture ministries across all seven provinces, crop-cutting surveys conducted by agricultural offices, knowledge centres, and units under the Prime Minister’s Agriculture Modernisation Programme, and validated using remote sensing data from a joint survey with the Integrated Centre for Mountain Development (ICIMOD).
Paddy remains crucial to Nepal’s food security. According to the National Statistics Office, the agriculture sector contributed around 25.16 percent to Nepal’s GDP in FY 2024/25, with paddy alone accounting for approximately 12 percent of the sector’s output.
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