Misinformation

This is in response to a news article titled "Security check, an ordinary man’s ordeal"
published in your newspaper dated 18 December, 2001. It is to clarify that no Pakistani diplomat has been caught with the RDX explosive as mentioned in the newspaper.

Muhammad Raza Jalil
Second Secretary (Press & Culture)
Embassy of Pakistan, Kathmandu

Basic training

This refers to the article "Woman farmers and land reform" by Prativa Subedi published
in your newspaper dated December 15, 2001.

I appreciate her concern over poor agriculture production and lack of vision of our specialists and experts working in agriculture sector.

Going through the article, I found that the writer has emphasised that "the main reason for poor performance of agriculture sector is lack of women’s access to wealth and training to rural women". Is it a reality or just an overemphasis?

Definitely men and women play equal roles in agriculture or anywhere else. Why are we wasting time discussing who is more important, rather than working on other important issues like:

1) Lack of training (to both men and women).

2) Lack of basic knowledge on storage of agricultural produces. (In my village 50 percent of corn and one fourth of paddy are destroyed by different pests due to poor storage method).

3) Subsidy in improved seeds and their importance. (Farmers hesitate to use improved seeds either because it is expensive or they don’t understand its importance. Although I am an agriculture graduate, I have not been able to convince my parents and neighbours on using improved seeds. But I think they can be convinced by arranging ‘field demonstrations’ in every VDC.

The core of the poor agriculture production is not lack of women’s access to wealth, but lack of basic training for rural peasants.

Pradip Poudel
Sindhuli