Bhutan intends to acheive food self-sufficiency

Mar 29, 2014

The Ministry of Agriculture and Forests intends to achieve 60 to 75 percent of food self-sufficiency towards the end of the 11th Five Year Plan.

Bhutan is 50 percent food self-sufficient as of now.

To work towards the goal, the ministry has started implementing policy on food and nutrition security. The ministry had felt the need for a policy as it had not been able to make much difference in the past, without one.

In January this year, the cabinet had endorsed the policy that was drawn by the agriculture ministry.

The Ministry’s planning officer, Pema Thinley, said Bhutan has just about 2.9 percent of arable land. He said they are now looking into land consolidation and development. Their strategy is to bring all the land together so that the modern technologies could be put to work.

The poverty analysis report 2010 of the National Statistical Bureau states only 5.9 percent of the population is below the food poverty line.