Facing mounting complaints from farmers over crop damage caused by monkeys, the Division Forest Office in Arghakhanchi has selected 26 ‘monkey watchers’ to protect maize fields in areas worst affected by human-wildlife conflict.

The office had initially sought applications for 20 watchers, announcing a three-day application window on Wednesday. By Friday, 70 people, including two women, had applied for the temporary positions.

Applicants were required to be locals from monkey-affected areas and capable of driving away monkeys from farms. Following the high demand and the extent of crop damage reported from several areas, the office increased the number of selected watchers from 20 to 26.

“We had called for 20 monkey watchers, but after receiving requests from farmers across large areas where monkeys have damaged maize crops, we increased the number to 26,” said Keshar Khadka, information officer at the Division Forest Office. “We will formally announce the selected watchers in the presence of Chief District Officer Toya Narayan Subedi.”

All 26 selected watchers are men. The two women who applied were not selected because they lived in market areas rather than the affected rural communities.

The selected watchers, aged between 18 and 45, will begin work on Sunday and continue until September 26, a period of two months. Each will receive a monthly payment of Rs12,500 from the forest office.

They will also receive training on safety measures and techniques for handling monkey encounters.

The initiative is unusual because no government agency has allocated a separate budget for the wages or operational costs of the watchers. Instead, community forest user groups operating under conservation-based management systems in Shitaganga Municipality have collected funds and handed them over to the Division Forest Office to finance the programme.

Out of 61 wards across six local units in Arghakhanchi, 26 locations have been identified as severely affected by monkey raids.

According to Khadka, the selected watchers will receive around three hours of training from officials, including Subedi and Narayan Dev Bhattarai, chief of the Division Forest Office.

They will be provided with necessary equipment and taught methods to drive monkeys away when they enter farmland and damage maize crops. The training will also include techniques to discourage monkeys from entering settlements, including ways to redirect them towards natural food sources instead of allowing them to rely on food available in farmers’ homes.

The move comes as farmers in Nepal’s hill districts increasingly struggle with rising losses from monkey attacks. In many rural communities, repeated raids on maize, fruit trees and other crops have become a major source of economic distress, prompting local authorities and communities to explore unconventional solutions such as hiring dedicated watchers.