An agricultural group named ‘Gaki Tsheshey Detshen,’ with 11 women members in Dungkarcholing Chiwog under Kilkhorthang Gewog in Tsirang ventured into commercial vegetable farming in 2014. Although, it was not so great startup venture, today the group is quite popular in the district for its fresh and organic vegetables.
Women have erected a green house each in their backyards. Besides running daily errands, taking care of vegetable crops in the greenhouse has become a daily routine. Every Sunday, the group takes their produce at the Sunday Vegetable Market in Damphu Town. They get returns of Nu 2,000-5,000.
However, there are several hiccups faced by the group and these are: competing for market with other farm groups, labour crunch and lack of irrigation water. Apart from that, clearing their stocks during peak vegetable season has been an uphill task.
“Now, there are several groups in the districts. Sometimes we cannot sell all our produce. We don’t have access to market outside the district nor we have a vehicle to take our vegetables,” said one of the members from the group, Tsheden.
Nonetheless, the group plans to address the problem with funds that are available with them. “We collect Nu 200 each every month as a membership fee. We cannot charge higher amount than this because we have to use the money for other expenses. So our plan is to accumulate enough money and avail loan to buy a power tiller,” said, another member of the group, Deki Peldon.
The group also has plans to construct office. “Dzongkhag has given us chips making machine but we don’t have proper place to keep it. We have to maintain records, so we are going to construct office and store room. We have written to the dzongkhag to lease us some 50 decimal of land,” stated the group.
The members of the group are also skilled in mushroom farming, producing potato chips and churning juices from fruits. So they are confident that their vegetable farming venture will flourish by the day, creating gainful employment opportunities for youth.
