SOLUKHUMBU: Nepali indigenous paper industries in this mountainous district are gradually closing down in lack of a conducive atmosphere.
Of total of 20 such industries in the district only four are now in operation as revealed by that data maintained by the Cottage and Small Industries Development Committee.
Dudhkoshi Paper Industry in Jubhing of Khumbu Pasang Lamu rural municipality-1 is the latest of the industry to be closed. Lack of manpower is leading to the closure of such industries, according to Prem Thapa Magar, its proprietor. At present the people who invested in the traditional industry with the high hope of generating both income and employment for the locals are now struggling to merely sustain their business.
Saraswoti Nepal Paper Industry at Mahakulung rural municipality is also on the verge of closure. “Tedious government policy and rules are also blamed for the discouraging atmosphere for paper industries,” said proprietor Uttam Kumar Rai. He insisted that the government should bring a flexible policy and other measures to promote paper industries. Good profit is expected if such industries are provided appropriate atmosphere to operate to their full potentiality and efficiently.
Mangal Sing Tamang, who owns the MD Paper Industry based in Mapya Dudhkoshi rural municipality shares similar experiences. He has no sufficient human resources to collect Lokta (raw materials extracted from Argeli plant for making the Nepali paper) from the jungle.
Alpine zone in the district has much production of raw materials for the Nepali paper. Argeli plants are abundant in the community as well as private forests. However, its proper utilization is marred by various types of challenges. Lokta can be used for making doko traditional baskets and Namlo, a kind of thick rope necessary to carry or transport loads in the areas without road facility. However, lack of skilled human resources, state’s clear policy and less investment stand as the barriers for their production and promotion.
KATHMANDU: Buddha Air is operating flights to Kolkata, India from May-end. Buddha Air will operate its flights to Kolkata with the ATR 72-500 aircraft. It will operate three regular flights a week. The flights would be operated on Monday, Wednesday and Friday every week.
Buddha Holidays, sister organisation of Buddha Air, will launch various religious and holiday packages for Indian passengers, and Kolkata tour package and Gangasagar and Jagannath temple worship package for Nepali passengers.
The Air has total 11 aircraft into operation (including six ATR 72-500 and three ATR 42-320). Another ATR-72 aircraft will operate from the next month, said the company.
Earlier, Buddha Air had planned to start flights to the east Indian city from mid-April. It changed its flight dates considering the parliamentary elections in India.
KATHMANDU: Various visa related complications have deterred foreign nationals into investing in Nepal, according to a study revealed at a program by the Institute for Strategic and Socio-Economic Research (ISSR) at the Pavilion Hall, Durbarmarg today.
Dr. Govinda Nepal presented a paper on issues involving complications on visa procedures faced by foreign investors at the program.
He presented a number of visa related problems that foreign investors other than Indian nationals face in Nepal. Of the problems, he noted that visa procedure is long, tedious and complex.
The procedure involves a lot of paper work requiring one to sign documents as many as 32-38 times. Besides, the rules and acts governing visa are unclear thereby confusing a stakeholder and delaying the visa procedure, according to Dr. Nepal who is also the Acting Chairperson of Pavilion Group.
Another major issue facing visa issue is the time length. While the minimum time period involved in visa processing is 6 weeks, the maximum time for the same is 32 weeks.
Likewise, complexity surrounding visa has complicated the recruitment of skilled employees (by 100 percent) thereby adversely affecting the investment decision, said Dr. Nepal.
Dr. Nepal suggested among many other measures, in shorting out the visa related problems by initiating online visa processing system and a one window policy in issuing visa and work permits.
“The government will definitely consider these issues and work towards easing visa issuance procedures through coordination among concerned ministries,” remarked Gokarna Bista, Minister for Labor, Employment and Social Security.
KATHMANDU: Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) went up by 5 points on Thursday, the last trading day of the week.
The benchmark index increased by 5.4 points to close at 1155.50 points. Similarly, the Sensitive Index, that majors the transactions of big companies, went up by 1.36 points to settle at 246.10 points.
A total of 1,339,972 units of shares of 171 companies worth Rs. 485,877,931 were traded yesterday.
GORKHA: The work of data collection in and around potential area to be covered by the Budhigandaki Hydropower Project has begun since yesterday.
The 1, 200 MW hydropower project is likely to affect places in Gorkha and Dhading districts.
Around 30,000 ropani land would be inundated at Gandaki rural municipality, Shahidlakhan rural municipality, Arughat rural municipality and Bhimsen Thapa rural municipality in Gandaki once the project comes into being.
The project’s Resettlement and Rehabilitation Unit has initiated gathering data related to house, sheds, physical structures, fruit plants and other trees situated in inundation-affected areas in Gorkha and Dhading districts from Wednesday.
Krishna Karki, chief of Project’s Resettlement and Rehabilitation Unit Siurenitar Office, shared that technicians of Agriculture Knowledge Centre, Building Division Office and Forest Office here have been mobilized for gathering data.
“Data collection has started at Ghyalchowk Baseri of Gandaki rural municipality in Gorkha and Salang in Dhading from Wednesday”, he informed. The technical human resource has been mobilized in a way to complete data collection within two months, he further said.
“An arrangement has been made so that the enumerators can collect data in the inundated areas through mobile apps”, office chief Karki shared.
The project has the target to complete the distribution of land compensation within coming mid-April and compensation related to house, sheds and fruit plants within mid-July.
KATHMANDU: Almost 76 percent of the youths heading for foreign unemployment are unskilled, reveals a study by the Ministry of Labor, Employment and Social Security.
Though the government aims at ending compulsive out migration for work in coming five years over 40,000 Nepali youths leave the country for foreign employment every month, according to the statistics maintained by the Department of Foreign Employment.
While around 5, 30,000 Nepali left for foreign employment in the past 25 years, only 2.5 percent of them were skilled, 21.5 percent of them were semi-skilled and 75 percent of them were unskilled.
“The country is suffering a great loss in its inability to develop skilled human resources and create job opportunities in the country,” said Mahesh Dahal the Department of Foreign Employment. Nepali youths have been migrating for work abroad, mostly as unskilled workers for the past three decades.
Devastating earthquake in 2015 caused damage in the agricultural and industrial sector. As such, many youths employed in these sectors are forced to go for abroad employment, according to a survey by the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Supplies.
Even the returnees are found migrating by obtaining labor permit as unskilled workers. “Government’s inattention towards exporting skilled manpower is unfortunate. This has caused loss to the workers themselves and the nation,” said Madhubishal Pandit, an expert on foreign employment.
Number of workers going for foreign employment is on the rise since the fiscal year 2006/2007. Around 1,00,000 Nepali youths left for foreign employment in the seven months of the current fiscal year alone. However, this figure is low compared to the number of youths going abroad by obtaining labor permit last year.
WASHINGTON: The United States grounded Boeing Co’s money-spinning 737 MAX aircraft on Wednesday over safety fears after an Ethiopian Airlines plane crash that killed 157 people, leaving the world’s largest planemaker facing its worst crisis in years.
The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) cited new satellite data and evidence from the scene of Sunday’s crash near Addis Ababa for its decision to join Europe, China and other nations in suspending 737 MAX flights. The crash was the second disaster involving the 737 MAX, the world’s most-sold modern passenger aircraft, in less than five months.
The new information from the wreckage in Ethiopia and newly refined data about the plane’s flight path indicated some similarities between the two disasters “that warrant further investigation of the possibility of a shared cause,” the FAA said in a statement.
The acting administrator of the FAA, Daniel Elwell, said he did not know how long the U.S. grounding of the aircraft would last. A software fix for the 737 Max that Boeing has been working on since a fatal crash last October in Indonesia will take months to complete, Elwell told reporters.
“The agency made this decision as a result of the data gathering process and new evidence collected at the site and analyzed today,” the FAA said, shortly after U.S. President Donald Trump announced the planes would be grounded.
It was the second time the FAA has halted flights of a Boeing plane in six years. It grounded the 787 Dreamliner in 2013 because of problems with smoking batteries.
Southwest is the world’s largest operator of the 737 MAX 8 with 34 jets. France’s air accident investigation agency BEA will analyze black-box cockpit voice and data recorders from the crashed plane, a spokesman said.
The French announcement resolved uncertainty over the fate of the two recorders after Germany’s BFU said it had declined a request to handle them because it could not process the new type of recorder used on the 737 MAX jets, in service since 2017.
Shares of the company ended up 0.5 percent at $377.14, recovering from a more than 3 percent fall in the afternoon when the FAA announcement was made. The United States had held back on suspending 737 MAX flights on Tuesday even as many of the world’s top economies such as China and European nations grounded the plane.
Trump called Boeing Chief Executive Dennis Muilenburg on Wednesday to inform him that the United States was preparing to ground the fleet, a White House official said.
A view of Rabhunwaghat along the Dudhkosi River. This stretch of the river serves as the boarder for Khotang and Okhaldhunga districts. Construction of 800 MW Dudhkosi reservoir hydro-project is underway here.
Photo: RSS
YOKOHAMA : Carmakers Renault, Nissan and Mitsubishi Motors announced the creation of a joint board Tuesday as they seek to plot a future for their alliance after the downfall of former boss Carlos Ghosn.
The new board structure will be headed by Renault Chairman, Jean-Dominique Senard and replaces two previous bodies based in Netherlands – one joining Renault and Nissan, the other combining Nissan and Mitsubishi Motors.
“We have decided to join our forces again to enhance the strength of our collaboration,” Senard told reporters. This is a “new start” for the alliance, added the Frenchman.
Senard also announced he would “not be seeking” to replace Ghosn as the Head of Nissan but would be a “clear candidate” to be the vice-president of the company.
Current Nissan boss, Hiroto Saikawa said the new board represented “a true partnership on equal footing.” Ghosn, recently released on bail in Japan ahead of a trial over alleged financial misconduct, is widely credited with creating the three-way alliance, which now outsells all other rival groups.
As boss of Renault, he took what many observers at the time thought was a gamble by saving Nissan from the brink of bankruptcy and tying it to the French firm.
(Agencies)
KATHMANDU: Discussion on the amendment proposal on ‘Public Private Partnership and Investment Bill-2075’ is underway at the House of Representatives. The government floated the bill with the objective of expediting infrastructure development.
The proposal is registered to widen sphere of the Investment Board Nepal (IBN). This new bill has been brought after the Investment Board Act-2068 BS proved ineffective in practice.
The new bill sets the target to enhance economic growth by mobilizing capital of above Rs 6 billion through public-private partnership concept. It is necessary to mobilize Rs 150 billion to achieve economic growth rate up to nine per cent, according to a source at the Ministry of Finance. Private sector has the capacity to mobilize Rs 100 billion in recent period.
In the meeting, Finance Minister, Dr Yuba Raj Khatiwada said that the new bill has been brought to further broaden the parameter and scope of the Investment Board for achieving economic prosperity through the development of infrastructure. He added that the bill will pave the way for making investment for the development of infrastructure by means of private capital.
Stating that it was necessary to invest in mega projects for achieving high economic growth rate, the Finance Minister believed that the private sector would not be affected because of the foreign investment.
Lawmaker Janardan Sharma said that the government needs to identify large projects and invest in them through the Investment Board, stressing the works to be carried out by the Board should be done through inter-ministry coordination.
Lawmakers Divya Mani Rajbhandari and Gagan Kumar Thapa demanded that leaders of the main opposition parties should be included in the Board. Similarly, lawmakers Bhara Kumar Shaha, Rekha Sharma, Santa Kumar Tharu, Chudamani Khadka, Khem Lohani, Bina Kumari Shrestha and Prem Suwal called for broadening the scope of the Investment Board.