SNV organised a high-level multi-stakeholder meeting to shed light on the alarming rate of disease infestation of large cardamom crops in East Nepal.

Nepal is the largest producer of cardamom and accounts for two-thirds of global output.  However, the spread of diseases - locally known as furkhe and chirke - has infested 60-70 percent of farms in Nepal due to the lack of awareness and the reluctance of farmers to take corrective measures to uproot the problem.

As a result, large cardamom production has been decreasing 20-30 percent annually which has inflated prices by 238 percent over the past 8 months.

Subesh Rai, a local farmer fro Ilam who attended the meeting said that "if initiatives and are not taken immediately, cardamom growing areas will turn into barren land in five years".

An SNV Nepal adviser stated that "significant investments, management and resource support to farmers from the government and donor community is vital to revamp large sections of cardamom producing lands".

The interactive meeting highlighted the fact that if the spread of disease is not tackled then 70,000 farmers will be in jeopardy of losing their livelihood.

As a conclusion, the secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives reiterated the need for respective stakeholder to come up with investment plans to save the cardamom sub-sector and confirmed that the ministry would set a three-year plan to mitigate the problems in order to boost cardamom production for the years ahead.