Dec 9th marked the 15th day on the ongoing campaign for the 16 days campaign for Elimination of violence against women. Dec 9th Program was held as an Interaction Program on Review of Agricultural Policies to attain food security. 

Today’s event raised some important issues about food security in Nepal and how that affects violence against women. People present at the conference raised some key challenges about food security in Nepal and ways in which laws can be implemented to improve the current agricultural situation of our country. 

Representatives from many key organizations dealing with the current situation of food security in Nepal were present at the event including Nepal Permaculture society, who raised the current conflict of the Monsanto contention in our country. It was established that Monsanto was an issue of controversy in our current political situation and the government should consider this issue with great care. The public of Nepal does not know what the government’s stance in on the issue of Monsanto. Monsanto, which is an American based company, wants to expand its business in Nepal. However, we should be aware to various challenges that this company brings to our current agricultural situation. Why has Monsanto targeted Nepal? What is its main goal in our country and why should we care about hybrid germination? Monsanto raises some key challenges in the our current agricultural situation and we have take into consideration about various challenges it brings to farmer’s rights, community, local and environmental sustainability and food security. It also raises potential threats on the loss of local land races and threat to biological pest management. 

Nepal permaculture society recommends that we take Nepal current national context into consideration along with respect to farmers, promotion of indigenous seeds, effective verification and screening system if we want to let Monsanto expand its business in Nepal. 

Some key challenges were also discusses regarding the agriculture in Nepal. It was discussed that we need to establish and implement key policy issues and radicalize farming techniques in Nepal. Only 3% of agriculture in Nepal is for commercial use. 

Some issues of agriculture in Nepal that were discusses were poor performance in the agriculture sector, low production and productivity, growing food insecurity and vulnerability, underinvestment and ineffective governance and poor support services. 

It was establishes that these issues lead to food insecurity that becomes a key reason for violence against women. Every citizen has a right to food according to the law, but the law is not formulated to attain that goal. No party has taken responsibility or agriculture which puts an immense pressure on a large group of people on Nepal especially women. 

Dr. Renu Rajbhandari, Chairperson of Women’s human right defenders Nepal, voiced that agricultural ineffectiveness has been a major challenge faced by women. Food insecurity has led many women to accept menial jobs, which hamper their physical, mental and social well-being. Without appropriate policy workload for women have increased. 80% of Nepal’s labor relies on agriculture, but since the youth of Nepal are migrating to foreign countries the agricultural workload has been targeted towards elderly women. Women are never involved to create effective agricultural strategies.