Economy & Peace

THE latest findings on Nepal’s economy by Asian Development Bank only reconfirms what has all along been well-known—that our economy is not doing too well. Very little in it came as a surprise, but the forecast on Nepal in the Asian Development Outlook 2002, released by the Bank on Tuesday, nonetheless served the purpose of letting known the challenges the Nepalese economy is facing, while the overall Asian economic growth is expected to record a fairly positive growth. Nepal’s economic growth is expected to decline to 3.5 per cent this year from five per cent last year. As agriculture accounts for an overwhelming contribution to the Gross Domestic Product, the fact that growth in the agriculture sector will decline to three per cent this year on account of uneven monsoon rains has a major role to play in the overall expected downturn in the national economy. But agriculture in Nepal has always been dependent on the vagaries of weather and consequently erratic rains in a particular year means poorer economic growth for that year. However, the added factors in economic downturn in recent years, as ADO also pointed out, have been that manufacturing, tourism and trade suffered a great deal from insurgency and external conditions. Indeed, the effects of the insurgency are there for all to see. It has been quite instrumental in scaring tourists away as well as in affecting the manufacturing and trade sectors. The destruction by Maoists in more recent times of infrastructure and the government’s compulsion to divert more and more resources to security operations to fight the insurgency is bound to have a further negative impact on the economy this year.

ADO’s forecast that inflation will only be moderate in the next few years, if there is no external shocks to the economy, is one of several consolations contained in the report. Also, the forecast notes it as a plus that the Nepal-India treaty renewed earlier this year has ended the uncertainty surrounding Nepal’s exports to India. But in order to extract full benefits from this development, apparently Nepal’s industries would require to be more competitive to maintain their export growth. Ultimately, what it boils down to is this: Nepal desperately needs peace in order for it to arrest the economic decline. That forms part of ADB’s suggestion too when the report says that Nepal needs to restore law and order, achieve more rapid and broad-based economic growth, while carrying out structural reforms including improved governance and domestic resource mobilisation. Peace evidently is the first requisite. Nepalese may not know when peace will be fully restored, but they have some consolation in the fact that the present government is fully focussed on achieving it.

Craze To Go Abroad

MOST of the students in Nepal are obsessed with the thought of going abroad for studies. This yearning of the students is quite genuine if one were to assess the demand of the job market in Nepal. Almost all the private companies be they banks, business firms or academic institutions give priority to those who have a foreign degree. The widely accepted belief is that those who go to foreign institutes are more learned and competent. Though this argument is debatable the reality is that Nepalese with academic qualifications from abroad are dominating the job market. The influx of students to academic institutions abroad has surged over the past years. We have a large number of firms rendering services to the students to make their dreams come true. The craze to go abroad is so intense among the students that they are ready to pay any amount of fees to make their way into a foreign institute. Going by the news report delving into the activities of these firms, only a few of them are doing justice to the students. The reliability of these firms is questionable as most of them are not registered as education consultants with the government. As such we cannot expect such firms to be fully accountable to the students when they have not fulfilled the minimum legal procedures to make their activities transparent. Many firms have reportedly discontinued their services before meeting the demands of their clients. The firms sticking to their commitments are numbered and the students are being made scapegoats. Opening up a consultancy service for students is indeed a pious task. But what is desired is that the firms should be legally recognised and should take up their responsibility earnestly. The government must look into this matter in order to ensure that the students are not doped by those who are on the look out for easy money. If there is a transparent policy to monitor the activities of these firms, students would always be on the safer side. A mechanism through which the students can file complaints against the firm on grounds that it is not delivering the services promised is needed. Besides initiating the procedures to make the firms accountable to their services, the government must also conduct a thorough assessment of why students are preferring to move out of the country for higher studies and need to work together to improve the quality of higher education and equip students with the necessary skills to compete with those coming from abroad. Students would naturally be discouraged from going abroad if they can avail the opportunity to receive education that is at par with the education given abroad.