A Study on Agriculture and Migration of Nepal

Nepal is an agricultural country. Her economy is based on it and her most people depend on agriculture for their livelihood. But, despite the much efforts by government to develop the agriculture, it has not changed much for about half a century. Rather, the development efforts have resulted in environmental hazards and degradation of the daily life of the common people. Even the national parks aimed to conserve the forest and attract the tourists have end up in depriving the local people of their means of living. This, in addition to the population increase has caused the people to migrate in order to make their ends meet: migration from Northern hills to tarai region, the Southern plains in search of land and agriculture related jobs, and from rural areas through out the country to towns for various job opportunities. Neither the tarai nor the towns have enough capacity to absorb the immigrants. Thus, often the migrants wander from place to place and from job to job, creating additional problems to the already existing ones in each region. They have no choice but to encroach in the virgin forests in the tarai and to squatter and form slums in the towns, both of which could become a serious problem in the near future