NATIONAL7Spotlight Weekly)]

Data Delayed Is Data Denied

The delayed data compilation on tourism puts question mark on the government's sincerity on travel trade

By NAVIN SINGH KHADKA

Tourist in Kathmandu : Joyful stay

Listen to politicians' speech. Flip over official documents. Talk to planners at the National Planning Commission. What is your impression? Tourism is one of the top official priorities,

at least in words, right? But, when it comes to action, things are diametrically opposite.

From regulating travel trade to facilitating it, cases of official hitches and glitches are abundant. Enumerating their list may get too long here. One issue, however, is well and enough to test the official sincerity toward the tourism industry -- that to date has been guided by the private sector.

The issue of bringing out tourism related statistics is a case in point. Ministry of Tourism and Civil Aviation has been bringing out data book, comprising different data of tourism over the years. Until a couple of years ago, the statistics of a year used to be out within the mid part of the next year. Considering the laxity in all the government offices, the delayed publication of the data book (by about half a year) was well accepted and understood -- in the hope that things would improve.

Practically, they did not. Rather, they became worse. Consider this: After thumping its chest on what it claimed the success of Visit Nepal Year 1998, the officialdom took good two years to bring out the data book of the tourism bonanza year. What made the MoTCA take so long to prepare the database -- of which it already had brought a leaflet -- still remains a mystery.

Officials at the Statistics section of the ministry point their finger at the higher ups. "When they do not have the interest to bring out the statistics book what can we do?" said an official at the data section that brought out the data book of 1998 only last week.

Facing the backlash of the delayed 1998 data is the yet to be published 1999 database. All that the officialdom has made public about the 1999 figures is the arrival of tourists by air that year. What was the gross foreign exchange earnings from tourism last year? Have the number of tourism operators like hoteliers, travel/trekking agents gone up? Has the per tourist spending figure gone up? What about the average stay of a tourist? These are the questions waiting to be answered.

No one will know about them as long as the 1999 figures are not brought out. Interestingly, officials at the MoTCA are still in no position to confirm the date of the data publication. So, what is the hitch? "We also have to depend on other official agencies to prepare the databook," said a ministry official. "For tourist arrival figures we have to bank on the Department of Immigration and for the foreign currency income, the information will have to be supplied by the Nepal Rastra Bank."

Whatever reason may have kept the different agencies from supplying the tourism figures, the delay has put a question mark on the government's seriousness on travel trade. "The government may not find the data so useful but it should realize that there are many organizations that use the figures as their tools," say tourism experts

One such organization is the Nepal Tourism Board that uses the figures for analytical purposes. The private sector dominated body has a separate analysis unit that collects data from different organizations, puts them together, draws conclusions, and projects market scenarios. "I have been in regular touch with the Nepal Rastra Bank for tourism's gross foreign exchange income in 1999," says Bhisma Jit Pradhan, Research Manager at the Board.

Unable to act swiftly on issues like bringing out figures, the politicians, officialdom and planners still continue to harp that they are serious about tourism. Any buyer?

EVEREST EXPEDITION
Five Women Army

An all women Nepali expedition team sets out to climb the highest peak in the world

BY A CORRESPONDENT

What do most of the men who have set different records while summitting Mountain Sagarmatha (Everest) have in common? Simple They all are Sherpas. One of the first men to reach atop the highest peak was Tenzing Sherpa. The one to climb Mountain Sagarmatha in the shortest duration (20 fours 24 minutes) was Kaji Sherpa. The one who spent the longest duration on the highest point on the Earth was Babu Chhiri Sherpa. And even the one who climbed Everest for a record setting 10 times was Ang Rita Sherpa.

And now the youngest ever person who is planning to attempt Everest summitting is a Sherpa too. Considering all these, Sherpa men may well succeed to keep up their dominating legacy in the Nepali Himalayas.

But that is not where the story ends. Perhaps influenced by the daring males in their community, Sherpa women have also time and again come forward to accept the challenges of mountain climbing. One such heroine was Pasang Lhamu Sherpa who lost her life creating a record as the first Nepali women to have reached the Everest Summit.

At the face of it, the incident should have discouraged other Sherpa females to take part in the Himalayan expeditions. But that is not the case. In a bid to become the first Nepali women expedition team to summit the Mount. Sagarmatha, five Sherpa females have already reached Shyangboche and are preparing to reach the highest point on the Earth.

Minga Sherpa, 26, Lakpa Sherpa, 26, Dolma Sherpa, 23, Kasang Dikki Sherpa, 26, and Dawa Yangzi Sherpa, 22, have plan to scale the highest peak either on the early or mid part of May during this spring mountaineering season. More than one dozen other mountaineering teams, most of them westerners, are also climbing Everest this time.

All of these women mountaineers have not scaled any big mountains. They have only practiced on smaller trekking peaks below 6,000 meters. Before the expedition team left for Kathmandu earlier last wee, Mingma, who heads the expedition team, made a touchy statement to reporter I have to come back conquering the Everest since my two kids will be waiting for me