Rice production in Bhutan

[1] In a country where 79% of the population is engaged in agriculture, in 2006 the production of rice in Bhutan was 74,720 metric tons, with some 67,568 acres (273.44 km2) under cultivation.

Other areas include Paro and Wangduephodrang, which has one of the most important rice institutes in the country at Bajo.

According to Ganesh B. Chettri, the Joint Director of the Department of Agriculture, “We have lost a lot of land for infrastructural development purposes in Thimphu and other places but still the rice produced in Bhutan is sufficient for 50 percent of the population”.

[3] In 2018, it was reported that sustained decline in land under rice cultivation has resulted in a loss of more than 31,300 metric tonnes in the last two decades.

In the uplands where water scarcity is increasingly affecting farm output, farmers are switching back to traditional rice varieties known in the local language as Yangkum, Jama, Janaap, and Jakaap.