Agriculture - Kathmandu Valley

Agriculture is still an importent source of income for lots of families in the Kathmandu Valley. Mostly women take care of the fields, though men help with the plowing. Sometime the women also have a second job, for example in a small factory or somebodies household. On the potato fields in the Patan valley area, you see many man working on the field, for example to spray pesticides.

In the Kathmandu Valley the farmers grow, beans, potato, basmati rice and many more varities.

Rice Planting

The rice is planted on small terraces that are flooded one by one. The water flows to the rice fields through small canals that divert the water from the nearby river. Each small rice field is surround by dykes. The farmers make a hole in the dyke to flood the next field after they are finished with the cuurent rice field. Before the rice is planted in the water terrace, the rice is "pre grown" in small fields. It is said that the terraces are set under water to prevent weed from growing. In a later stage the fields slowly dry up, and the farmers, mostly women have to remove the weed. A lot of farmers in the Valley don't own their land, they use the rice fields in exchange of 50% of the harvest.

Lunch break with newari food (beaten rice, meat, beans, rice beer and raksi).