5 Paisa - Birendra Bir Bikram FAO

This piece was struck as part of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization coin program, a global initiative launched in 1968 that pressured member nations to issue commemorative circulation coinage promoting food production and agricultural development. Nepal's participation reflected the FAO's particular focus on South Asian food security during the early 1970s, a period when the subcontinent was still absorbing the aftershocks of the 1971 war and its refugee crisis. Birendra had ascended to the throne just the previous year following Mahendra's death in January 1972.