In Zhemgang, the villagers of Tali are calling for the Nangkor Gewog office to improve the road that leads to their farmlands. There are more than a hundred acres of fields at Zhaylingsi belonging to 25 households. Farmers grow cardamom, paddy, oranges and passion fruits among other cash crops in the area. Without a stable road, the villagers say they are losing interest in cultivating crops in the area.
Recent rain has aggravated the road condition. The road looks barely usable with long overgrown bushes, big puddles and mud. This has made even vehicles with four-wheel drive difficult to ply on the slippery road.
Farmers can be seen laying gunnysacks on the road and pushing a pickup truck carrying farm produce to negotiate the muddy road. With the road becoming inaccessible during summer, transporting farm produce to the market has become a major challenge for farmers.
“The road is the main problem here. It is especially very problematic during the summer months. If the local government could at least lay a base course on it, it would encourage the farmers to work more,” said Wangyel, a farmer.
“As most of our farmlands and gardens are located in the area, with the onset of monsoon, we are facing difficulties in accessing our farms,” said Sonam Choden, another farmer.
“It is improbable for the farmers to improve the road condition, so we are requesting our local leaders and the government to look into the matter and improve it,” said Pema Samdrup, a farmer.
Currently, people have to hire pickup trucks paying around Nu 3,000 for a trip to transport their farm produce. But that too is very difficult to get.
Meanwhile, the Nangkor Gup said that there is no budget allocated to lay the base course as the road is an access road which is not included in the farm road improvement budget. He also said base courses can only be done if the government re-prioritises funds for laying base courses on such roads.
The road was built in 2018 spending over Nu 7 M. And with no measures in the pipeline to improve the road in the foreseeable future, it looks like the difficulty of the farmers is here to stay.
Pema Samdrup, Zhemgang
Edited by Kipchu
