Sunsari. Buying and selling of goats has increased at the Agriculture Produce Market at Dharan Sub-metropolis-13 with the beginning of the festival. Farmers and traders from various hilly and terai regions of the country bring goats for sale in this market that runs on Thursday and Friday every week.

Shyam Bahadur Basnet of Sankhuwasabha has been involved in animal husbandry business for the past 18 years. “I have been visiting the agriculture market in Dharan every year when the festival begins,” he said. This time I have brought 15 goats, only one has been sold so far, the rest have to be sold. ’

Mamata Rai of Sagurigadhi Rural Municipality-7 in Dhankuta district also regularly sells goats in the Dharan market. “Livestock rearing is our ancestral occupation, we get grass in the village, we don’t lose business even if we have to buy grain and feed,” he said. According to him, he earns more than nine lakh rupees annually by selling goats.

Naisat Miya, a businessman of Duhabi Municipality-5 in Sunsari district, has been buying goats from Dharan every Thursday and Friday. He said that he bought 100 to 150 goats in a day and sent them to Jhumka, Itahari, Biratnagar, Lahan, Janakpur and other places for sale. “I have been running this business for 31 years and now I make a profit of Rs 80,000 to Rs 100,000 per month,” he said.

According to Laxman Bhattarai, chairperson of Dharan Agriculture Produce Market Management Committee, around 4,500 goats are sold every day. He said that in the last fiscal year 2081/82 alone, more than 120,000 goats were sold and business worth Rs 2.4 billion was done.

Stating that the business of goats increases from August every year, Bhattarai said that the turnover of goats has decreased in August this year. “There was a problem in transportation due to incessant rains in July. The sale and purchase of goats has decreased this year as compared to last year due to the Jenji demonstration in August and the disruption of transportation,” he said.

Traders and farmers from Dhankuta, Sankhuwasabha, Panchthar, Bhojpur, Tehrathum, Itahari, Kanepokhari, Inaruwa, Jhumka, Belbari and other Terai districts come to Dharan’s agriculture market for goats.

Bhattarai, chairman of the Dharan Agriculture Produce Market Management Committee, said that the goats sold from here are exported to India via major cities of the country.