Large Cardamom (Amomumsabulatum, Roxb.) is a perennial herbaceous spice crop grown from an elevation of 600 to 2000 masl where annual rainfall is between 1,500 to 2,500 mm and the temperature varies from 8° C to 20° C.
Being a shade loving plant, cardamom is plated as understory of Alnus Nepalensis. Thus promoting large cardamom itself maintains the forest cover in the mountain thereby preventing soil erosion, gullies and landslides.
It has been listed as one of the most potential crop for export in Nepal Trade Integration Strategy 2010. Lamjung is one of the 40 districts of Nepal where the cultivation of this crop is expanding. Large Cardamom is the third commercial and exportable horticultural crop grown in the district. The planted area in the district reached to 184 ha; productive area is 125 ha with a production of 62 mt in FY 2014/15. It is estimated that the immediate potential area in the district is over 1000 ha. Despite having potentiality, there are constraints for its promotion which is related to the inadequate supply of saplings, non-utilization of byproducts (stems) left over after the harvest of cardamom, inadequate financial resources to invest on materials and services and inadequate knowledge and skills among the producers and entrepreneurs. In order to address these issues and constraints, this project has been designed for 5 VDCs of Lamjung district with a goal of improving the livelihood of upland poor and vulnerable indigenous farming communities and entrepreneurs. The major output proposed include the development of resource centre for for information and technology and quality planting materials in the district, scaling up of successful production and green enterprise development technologies/techniques, demonstration of vermi-composting and enhancing capacity of farmers and entrepreneurs and institutional development. The project would contribute to the thematic areas of the promotion of green economy and enhancement of local livelihoods through forest and agriculture based micro-enterprises. It would also support the second thematic areas of GEF such as climate smart agriculture by reduce greenhouse gas emissions which contributes to the mitigation of climate change. Similarly, it will also contribute to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) of ending hunger and poverty, and achieving food security and sustainable agricultural development. At the end of the project, additional 10 ha of additional area would be brought under cardamom plantation, 100, 000 utis saplings would be produced per annum , quality improvement of over 20 mt of cardamom using improved dryers. About 200 households would benefit directly and additional 200 households indirectly from the project activities. In sum the initiated green enterprises related activities result into the increase in the household income by about 25 percent from the existing level for beneficiary households.