While the export of agricultural produce dropped comparatively during the second week of October, exports have picked up again. According to a report by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forests (MoAF), the drastic drop resulted from issues related to Plant quarantine certification by the counterpart in India. The exports started to rise after the issues have been resolved.
The MoAF reported a 50 per cent drop in exports of agricultural produce during the second week of October. Only over 1,000 metric tonnes of agricultural produce were exported.
“The COVID-19 pandemic has created so much of disruption in transit and trade. More importantly, I think we had issues with customs in India. So whatever we are exporting from Bhutan to India, it has to be certified by the Bhutan Agriculture and Food Regulatory Authority and this certificate issued by this regulating agency has to be accepted in the system at the land Customs in India. So this way there was some misunderstanding between the agencies,” said Rinzin Dorji, the Secretary of MoAF.
The issues were with crops such as potato, apple, ginger and areca nut.
However, the issue has since been resolved and the exports are increasing again. During the last week of October, more than 1,600 metric tonnes of agricultural produce was exported.
Similarly Export of agricultural produce via Phuentshogling dropped by more than 75 per cent in the second week of October while export via Gelegphu increased by manifolds. According to the report, this was due to export disruption to India via Phuentshogling.
According to the latest report by the ministry, 90 per cent of the agricultural produce is exported to India while 10 per cent is exported to Bangladesh.
Kinley Dem
