Sugarcane farmers receive subsidy

By Our Correspondent,Sarlahi, Jan. 3: The sugarcane farmers of Sarlahi have received the subsidy amount after one year. According to Kapil Muni Mainali, president of the Federation of Sugarcane Producers’ Association, the subsidy amount has been received in the bank account of each sugarcane farmer.

The District Treasury Controller Office handed over the cheque of subsidy amount to the banks and financial institutions to deposit it to the concerned farmers’ bank account last Thursday. Mainali said that banks have deposited money in the farmers' accounts.

According to him, the government has provided the subsidy amount of sugarcane sold by farmers a year ago only after the farmers organized a protest. Last year, when the price of sugarcane was fixed at Rs. 610 per quintal, it was decided that the industry would provide Rs. 540 per quintal and the government would provide Rs. 70 as a subsidy.

The government had released only around Rs. 110 million out of the total subsidy amount of Rs. 292 million that had to be provided to farmers of Sarlahi before Dashain festival. After the government had released insufficient amounts, farmers were paid at the rate of 30 per cent, i.e., at the rate of Rs. 21 per quintal out of Rs. 70.

With the government recently sending the remaining subsidy amount, the farmers have received their full amount of subsidy for the sale of sugar last year.

Nirmal Neupane, chief of District Treasury Controller Office, Sarlahi, said that every bank and financial institution was instructed to deposit the amount in the farmer's account immediately after handing over the cheque. "As the farmers were really upset when they did not get the subsidy for a year, we sent cheques to the banks asking them to deposit the money into the farmers’ accounts immediately," Neupane said.

He asked the farmers to go to the bank where their subsidy money comes and find out whether the money has been deposited or not. The government has fixed the price of sugarcane at Rs. 635 per quintal for this year.

Out of the fixed price of sugarcane, the industrialists will provide Rs. 565 per quintal and the government will provide Rs. 70 as subsidy. As the government of Madhes Province has also announced an additional subsidy amount of Rs. 10 per quintal for this year, Mainali said that they would initiative to receive such subsidy amount.