Travel Vs. Trekking

WHEN China recognised Nepal as one of its outbound destinations late last year, tourism entrepreneurs in Nepal, who were not doing too well because of the general decline in tourism, naturally considered the development most welcome. Hopes rose that they could play host to some of the 12 million Chinese visitors who holiday abroad every year in countries China has recognised as outbound destinations. But there was one thing to be sorted out before Nepal would begin to welcome Chinese guests. The Nepalese government needed to designate officially-sanctioned handlers from among the hundreds of travel trade operators. China had designated 67 of its travel agents to handle Nepal-bound Chinese tourists. Nepal had to reciprocate on that count with its own selection. On Monday, the deadline for travel agents to apply for the selection to handle Chinese tourists ended. Along with it has popped up a controversy. The deadline coincided with officials of Trekking Agents Association of Nepal (TAAN) protesting the government intention to allow only travel agents, and not trekking agents, as handlers of Chinese tourists. Trekking agents, who number about 450, have demanded that some of them too be considered as handling agents so that they can sell trekking packages to Chinese tourists and also promote their products in the Chinese market. It does not look like a preposterous demand as presumably many Chinese tourists, when they visit Nepal, would not like to confine themselves to city limits, where travel agents by law are authorised to handle tourists. Some of them would certainly like to pace up and down one or two trekking trails.

What is this? Is the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation mishandling the selection process? Regulations clearly delineate the working areas of travel and trekking agents into city and trekking areas respectively. When only travel agents, around 70 of them out of the 500 in business, are selected as handlers for Chinese tourists, how are the trekking agents to do business, especially as was pointed out at the press meet, the memorandum of understanding signed between Nepal and China does not allow authorised travel agents to sub-contract trekking agents to handle Chinese visitors in trekking areas? What happens when a Chinese tourist, wishing to visit some trekking trails, finds that his travel agent cannot organise that trip to the Annapurna trail because that agent cannot do the job that is legally set aside for a trekking agent? It is unbelievable that right at this stage we are getting mired into all this and sending all the wrong signals to potential Chinese tourists. Excluding trekking agents is a wrong move. Is it so difficult to come up with a solution whereby both travel and trekking agents are happy and, most importantly, whereby Chinese visitors get to relish the tourism products they wish for? It can’t be.

Agro-based Research

IN a two-day workshop organised in Lamjung district the other day by the District Agriculture Research Centre to discuss ways to disseminate technologies developed by the research centres, agriculture scientists and experts stressed on the need for active participation of farmers in researches conducted in the farms so that they can effectively apply appropriate technologies developed by the agriculture research centres. For a nation like Nepal that depends heavily on the agriculture sector to not only contribute a major portion of its GDP but to also feed the country’s burgeoning population, the nation’s agriculture research centres obviously play a pivotal role. The more so if we are to consider the very fact that over 95 per cent of the people are engaged in the agriculture sector and that their socio-economic well-being hinges on the yields that they can coax out from their farms. Considering the nation and its people’s inordinate dependence on the agriculture sector, the government, with a view to secure and safeguard both their future, instituted agriculture research centres throughout the nation. That these research centres have not belied the government’s objectives can be gleaned from new hybrid grains, fruits and animals that are being developed by them. Had it not been for these research centres’ laudable contributions to the agriculture sector, the nation’s farmers and its economy would have long experienced bitter yields and production.

However, as far as taking their newly developed technologies, including high-yielding plant varieties and animal breeds, to the doorsteps of the farmers is concerned, it so seems that these centres still have many more brain-storming workshops to organise and attend. The fact that their products have yet to reach the vast majority of the farmers can be seen from their obsolete farming techniques, low-yielding seeds and, needless to point out, low purchasing power because of tardy harvests. Of course, some of the woes that the farmers are currently facing could be due to other factors such as increasing fragmentation of farms, lack of necessary inputs like chemical fertilisers and their own reluctance to use better farming techniques and inputs. Notwithstanding all this, the centres cannot afford to be "ivory towers" simply because any failure in the nation’s agriculture sector could bring about problems to its vast population and economy. Hence, the centres should and must speedily chalk out and implement appropriate schemes to have mutually beneficial interactions with their targetted beneficiaries—herein, the farmers.