BIRENDRANAGAR, SURKHET: Karnali province has a shortfall of 19,116 metric tonnes of food grains annually, according to statistics shared by the Karnali provincial government.

Out of the 10 districts in the province, Salyan, Rukum West and Surkhet are self-sufficient in food while the remaining districts have to import food grains. Food grain production in Dailekh, Jajarkot, Humla, Kalikot, Jumla, Mugu and Dolpa districts is not enough to last the whole year. However, among these districts, Dailekh and Jumla import less food grain compared to the rest of the food-deficit districts, said the Agriculture Directorate under the Ministry of Land Management, Agriculture and Cooperatives, Karnali Province Government.

The director at the Directorate Chitra Bahadur Rokaya said the provincial government is implementing various programs to make all districts in the province self-reliant on food grains. To achieve this goal, he said, the province government has adopted the concept of ‘organic province’ and all the bodies have an important role in making this program successful.

A survey conducted in 2019 in the hilly and mountainous districts of the province by the World Food Program, EPI and FAO showed that overall 28 percent of the households in the province were not consuming the required amount of food.

Eight percent of these households were consuming extremely low quantity of food, and this fact is construed as hunger situation.