Waiting
For Relief
WITH Nepal’s
tourism showing all the signs of an industry in the doldrums, it is unfortunate that
relief package to revive it is still not in sight. Early this month, travel trade
entrepreneurs said in a forceful fashion that unless some drastic measures were taken by
the government, the tourism industry was in for a long, dark period. The sooner some
measures were taken to arrest the declining trend in tourist arrivals, less danger there
was of seeing many businesses closed. The alarm was sounded following the sharp downturn
in tourist arrivals after the September 11 terrorist attacks in the United States. Just
when it had looked like the country’s tourism would pick up after being in the slump
following the June 1 tragedy, the traditional autumn season was hit by an incident
occurring far away. Holiday-makers all around the world had second thoughts about
venturing out to faraway destinations because of security concerns. As a result, the
autumn tourist season on which Nepalese travel trade entrepreneurs had pinned much hope
for the industry’s revival experienced a direct fallout of the general worldwide
aversion to spend holidays abroad. A gathering of top bosses in the tourism field had
called for a relief package from the government to keep Nepal’s tourism floating.
Some short-term measures, to be followed by longer-term steps, were urgently needed to put
the tourism industry back on the track. Some hospitality establishments and restaurants
were already mulling closure. Travel trade businesses were going through hard times just
to keep the shutters up. In short, there were predictions of gloom all around.
Responding to this
clamour for relief, the government promised that it was going to introduce measures soon.
The hopes are that it has not gotten round to do that because of the Dashain holidays. It
is essential that some kind of a relief package is announced within this month if not
before Tihar, which is two weeks away. For, any delay in soothing the nerves of travel
trade and hotel people could result in the latter deciding to close shops. Demands for
concessional loans for travel trade establishments, visa waiver, more airlines flying to
Nepal and other measures are necessary short-term measures that could cushion some of the
negative impact. Given that promoting Nepal in the western hemisphere is a difficult task
in the present situation, Nepal Tourism Board should pay more attention to sell the
country as a destination for tourists from the East. If such steps are not taken now, the
coming spring tourist season too could suffer.
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