No hassle with the hazelnut? The economy-wide impacts of a large-scale contract farming scheme in Bhutan

The Mountain Hazelnut Venture (MHV) is a large-scale contract farming scheme, particularly in the context of Bhutan. The objective of the MHV scheme is to plant 10 million hazelnut trees on about 9,000 hectares of formerly fallow land, i.e. about 12% of cultivated land in Bhutan (ADB, 2015). An estimated 15,000 farmers, about 20% of all agricultural households, are expected to benefit from hazelnuts as an additional income source. MHV is also the first 100% owned foreign direct investment project in the Eastern Himalayan Kingdom.