Binod
Bahadur Shrestha Officiating President of FNCCI
FNCCI First
Vice-President Binod Bahadur Shrestha has assumed the position
of Officiating President of Federation of Nepalese Chambers of
Commerce & Industry (FNCCI).
MoU
Signed between FNCCI, CCPIT to boost trade & Investment
With a view
to promote trade and economic cooperation between Nepal and People's
Republic of China, a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) has been
signed in Kathmandu on 30 November 2002.
The Federation
of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FNCCI) and China
Council for the Promotion of International Trade (CCPIT) signed
the MoU.
Binod Bahadur
Shrestha Officiating President of FNCCI and Liu Wenjie, Vice Chairman
of CCPIT signed the MoU on behalf of their respective organizations.
According
to the MoU, both organization will exchange information and their
publications for the promotion of trade and investment including
bilateral ties and joint ventures on hydropower, tourism and other
potential areas.
Similarly,
the two organizations will increase contacts and exchange information
with regard to trade and technical know-how with the objectives
of promoting bilateral trade and investment, especially for the
small and medium scale industries. As per the MoU, FNCCI and CCPIT
have agreed to organize seminars and workshops, trade fairs and
consultancy services for the entrepreneurs of both the countries.
Speaking on
the occasion, Officiating President of FNCCI Shrestha said, "It
is very hard for Nepali entrepreneurs to compete with Chinese
and other foreign products in the Chinese market. To bridge huge
trade gap between us it is not possible without some preferences
to the Nepali goods. Therefore there is a need to extend the preference
to main land China. "He further added that the payment mechanism
for the trade of Nepal with Tibet is still conventional.
Leader of
12-member Chinese delegation and Vice-Chairman of CCPIT Wenjie
expressed his hopes that the trade between two neighbours would
be increased if the such programmes are forwarded in accordance
with the MoU signed with the FNCCI.
FNCCI
appoints Trade Representatives in different Countries
With the objective
promoting bilateral trade and attracting foreign investment, the
Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FNCCI)
has recently appointed following persons as FNCCI Honorary Trade
Representatives; Mr. Biam Hongdeng, China; Mr. Mukunda Man Amatya,
France; Mr. Dev Man Hirachan, Japan; Mr. Mikhail Sergeyevich Nekrasov,
Russia; Dr. Dev Kaji Dangol, Qatar and Ms. Mary C. Carroll, USA.
Australian
announcement on LDC goods welcomed
The Federation
of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FNCCI) the apex
body of the private sector has welcomed the announcement of the
Australian government to provide duty-free and quota free access
to the products of the least developed countries (LDCs) from July
1, 2003.
Australian
Prime Minister John Howard made this announcement at a summit
of the Asia Pacific Economic cooperation (APEC) recently held
in Mexico.
This is expected
to help countries like Nepal to promote their export trade.
The announcement
of the Australian government is in accordance with the Doha Work
Programme that facilitates multilateral trading system.
The FNCCI
has expressed belief that the announcement would have positive
impact on the Nepalese economy.
High
Level Economic Diplomacy Coordination Committee formed
The government
has formed a high-level economic diplomacy co-ordination committee
under the covernorship of the prime minister. The committee includes
the private sector and would aim to promote Nepali interests through
economic diplomacy.
Foreign minister,
finance minister, industry, commerce and supplies minister, labour
and transport minister, culture, tourism and civil aviation minister,
water resources minister, vice-chairman of the NPC, chief secretary,
finance and industry, commerce and supplies secretaries are members
of the committee.
The private
sector is represented by the president of the Federation of Nepalese
Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FNCCI), executive director of
the Nepal Tourism Board and President of the Nepal Chamber of
Commerce. Foreign secretary is the member secretary of the high-level
committee. According to the decision, a multilateral economic
affairs division has been set up at the foreign ministry combining
economic relations and coordination sections of the foreign ministry
to make the economic diplomacy more result oriented.
In accordance
with the direction of the high-level committee, the division will
formulate Nepal foreign economic policy and programmes related
to economic diplomacy. It will also be in charge of following
up on them to make economic diplomacy more effective. Its mandate
also includes mobilizing Nepali diplomatic missions abroad to
promote exports, attract foreign investment, tourism and foreign
employment programmes.
Nepal,
Israel sign Air Service Agreement
His Majesty's
Government of Nepal and the Israeli government signed a bilateral
Air Service Agreement (ASA) on November 18th. According to a press
release issued by the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation
(MOCTCA) Riddhibaba Pradhan, the secretary at the Ministry and
Ben Zion Salman, Minister of transport of the Israeli Government
signed the Agreed Minute and ASA text on their respective behalf.
As per the understanding each country can operate a maximum of
four flights and three cargo flights per week. "Israel is the
32nd country that has signed a bilateral ASA with Nepal, " says
the release.
Tourist
arrivals down by 18.31%
The number
of international visitors to Nepal in November declined by 18.31
percent compared to the corresponding period last year.
A total of
20,026 tourists arrived in Nepal by air in November, according
to a press release issued by Nepal Tourism Board (NTB) recently.
However,
the Indian tourist inflow continued to increase for the seven
month straight in November with a growth of 11 percent.
Japan and
Taiwan also registered growth of three and 10 percent respectively
as compared to the same period last year.
The third
country tourist arrivals have come down by 25 percent, registering
a net loss of 4,985 during the month.
From the Asian
countries, arrivals from Japan and Taiwan only managed to show
growth while China could not keep up with growth trend of demonstrated
in previous months and has gone down by four percent.
Sri Lanka
recorded a strong growth of 52 percent.
The Indian
market this month shows a remarkable improvement, up to 25 percent
of total arrivals from 18 percent registered in November.
Among the
third countries, Italian and Spanish markets have shown positive
signs, recording a growth of 82 percent and 116 percent respectively.
Higher growth
in these markets are observed because the base figure are quite
low.
The negative
growth trend this year from major tourist generating markets like
Germany, the United States of America, the United Kingdom, Denmark
and Netherlands has continued.
Including
the European market, the long-haul traffic from the United States
and the United Kingdom continued to plunged by 42 percent and
41 percent respectively.
NPC
announces implementation of Tenth Five Year Plan
The National
Planning Commission (NPC) on 17th December formally announced
the operationalization of the Tenth Five Year (2059-2064).
The Tenth
five Year Plan has been in operation since the beginning of the
running fiscal eyar (2059-2060) on July 17 with the prime objective
of achieving the economic growth in between 4.3 and 6.2 percent.
The Tenth Plan has set a target to narrow down the poverty to
30 percent from 38 percent in the next five years.
The volume
of the budget as per the current price is expected to be Rs. 490-640
billion.
Foreign resource
compoment 57 to 58 percent, development expenditure (growth rate)
10 to 15 percent and foreign assistance (growth rate) is expected
to 7 to 11 percent for the Tenth plan.
The NPC has
set a target to achieve the growth rate between 2.8 percent and
4.1 percent in agriculture sector and 5.2 to 7.5 in non agricultural
sector.
Declaring
the formal operationalisation of the Tenth Plan vice chairman
of the NPC, Dr. Shankar Sharma said that the plan in focused on
poverty alleviation by achieving the targeted economic growth.
If the security situation improves, he indicated that possibility
of achieving economic growth at six percent, but the growth will
be "around four percent if the situation as it is."
Highlighting
the main features of the plan, Dr. Sharma said that the Plan in
complementary to the Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF)
and is based on Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) prepared
by the meeting of the National Development Council.
He further
said that the plan has introduced participatory approach with
active participation of the private sector. He also clarified
that the plan this time has introduced log framework system on
the basis of unit cost analysis.
Food
Testing Laboratory has started functioning at Raxaul
The Central
Food Testing Laboratory of the government of India has started
functioning at Raxul which can be used for testing of food and
oil products. This is in accordance with Para-18 of the agreed
minutes of the India-Nepal Inter-Governmental Meeting held in
August 2002.
His Majesty's
Government of Nepal is requested by the Embassy of India, Kathmandu
to direct its exporters of vanaspati to export their goods to
India as far as possible using the Birgunj-Raxual checkpoint to
avail of the testing facilities offered by this laboratory.
Objectives
of Export Year 2003
On the eve
of the New Year the government organising a press conference on
December 31 formally annunced the objectives of the Export Year
(EY) 2003 along with the programmes it has chalked out in coordination
with the private sector.
The broad
objectives that the government has set for the EY includes sustainable
and reliable development of the export sector along with making
it more 'organised'.
To meet these
objectives and mark the EY successfully, the government has laid
emphasis on familiarising and conducting aggressive publicity
of the potential exportable products.
"Also the
government has targeted to honour the largest exporters, importders
and other people that contribute to the export promotion," Said
Krishna Hari Baskota, speaking at the programme.
Baskota, coordinator
of the publicity and event management sub-committee, said that
the government has also set programmes to aggressively participate
in the international trade fairs and simplify the policy and procedures
to boost exports.
The government
has earmarked a budget of Rs 35.7 million for the EY. "The private
sector would be contributing a direct investment of Rs 45 million
for the purpose," said Niranjan Baral, joint secretary at the
Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Supplies (MoICS).
According
to the programmes set by the government, the domestic foreign
traders would be participating in trade fairs in America, Canada,
Japan, Brussels, Germany, India, Bangladesh, Australia and China,
among others.
In the doemstic
front, the government, in coordination with the private sector,
has also sketched organisation of trade fairs in each of the five
development regions of the country before November 2003.
Also, the
government has announced of hosting an international-level trade
fair in Kathmandu from November 26 to 30, 2003.
Moreover,
the government has announced of hosting a number of discussion
programmes by inviting foreign based Nepali diplomats and Nepal-based
foreign diplomats.
The government
has also announced of establishing Handicrafts Village, initiating
on-line registration of export-import firms and lobbying for boosting
exports of carpet and garment to America, among others.
The MoICS
would function as a focal point to facilitate trade promotion
measures and would coordinate with the other line ministries for
the purpose.
