The Mountain Hazelnuts, one of the country’s biggest private companies, has sent around 300 of its employees on unpaid leave. It is for up to three months beginning this month. The company employs more than 400 people. According to the company’s management, it is an interim measure taken up to cut down cost for the sustainability of the company amid the pandemic.
Following the move taken by the Mountain Hazelnuts, around 13 employees have already started working at a construction site in Gyalpozhing under Monggar.
“The Company doesn’t have any bad feelings towards us. We must understand that the company is sailing through hard water due to the current pandemic. They also held meeting with us. We were actually not happy for directly putting us on unpaid leave. Since I have to look after my children, I came to work at the construction site rather than staying idle at home,” said Sithar Tenzin, an employee of Mountain Hazelnuts in Monggar.
“It is challenging for us when we are put on unpaid leave for two months because I have to look after my children. As my wife and myself are both on unpaid leave, we are going to face financial challenges soon. Though it is difficult to work at the construction site, we have no other alternatives than to work here,” added Thinley Dhendup.
The company claims to have incurred a huge loss last year due to the nationwide lockdown.
“Unfortunately the COVID-19 situation still has been evident and it has prevented us bringing in international due diligence’s visit so that we could have secured new funding. In terms of measure, we do see this is actually for the long-term sustainability of the company. It is a temporary measure and helps us conserve cash once we raise new funding and gives us time to do so,” said Sean Watson (PhD), the CEO of Mountain Hazelnuts.
“The interim measure that we have taken is we are trying to buy some time to raise some fund so that after these three months we would come back to our normal situation where we can take up all the activities as before. Please don’t get us wrong. We are in no way preparing to close our company in fact actually we are trying to come up with a new model which would take us more years from now,” said Tshering Dorji (PhD) Director, Field Operations and Research and Development, Mountain Hazelnuts.
The company has informed both the agriculture and the labour ministries. Mountain Hazelnuts was first established in the country in 2009 and currently, it has set up orchards in 18 districts.
Sonam Tshering, Monggar
