Monday, December 23, 2019

Nepal calls for tourism and investment promotion

Nepali ambassador to India Nilambar Acharya called for tourism and investment promotion in Nepal and further strengthening of India-Nepal economic relations.
Delivering a keynote speech at the ‘Visit Nepal 2020 Conclave’, organised by PHD Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PHDCCI) under aegis of its India-Nepal Centre / SDC and in association with the Embassy of Nepal, today at Bengaluru in India, he called for promoting tourism to make the Visit Nepal 2020 (VNY2020) a grand success.
Nepal is observing Visit Nepal Year 2020 aiming at hosting 2 million tourists. The conclave hosted the official launch of Nepal’s ‘Visit Nepal 2020 Campaign’ and discussed with key decision-makers’ and stakeholders’ from the government and industry, for positioning ‘Visit Nepal 2020’ to attract the visitors and investments from Southern India to Nepal.
Likewise, the chair of inaugural session former Indian ambassador to Nepal and chairman at the India-Nepal Centre under PHDCCI, K V Rajan highlighted the importance of tourism as a major sector for Nepal, both keeping economic and socio-cultural considerations. “Endowed with favourable natural conditions, the tourism in Nepal is all set to gain new height with Visit Nepal 2020, a meaningful campaign started by Nepal,” he added.
The two sessions and roundtable meeting hosted the voices of the policy-makers from the government and industry in Southern India, where they tried to explore the trade and investment opportunities with focus on tourism in Nepal.
The vision for ‘Visit Nepal 2020’ campaign is grand and reflects Nepal’s unwavering commitment to improving its competitiveness through investment, innovation, infrastructure development, regulatory reforms, new product offering, environment and wildlife conservation, and ensuring greater level of efficiency in service standards with the aim to develop tourism and economy in Nepal. Significantly, the government declared 2020 as the Visit Nepal Year with a goal to achieve 2 million arrivals and daily spending of tourists to over $75.
Remarkably, ‘Visit Nepal 2020 Campaign’ is being positioned as a ‘Lifetime Experience’ in a bid to establish Nepal and one of the world’s most unique experimental and lifetime value destinations. According to the government estimate, in 2018 Nepal received some 11,73,072 international tourists excluding domestic travelers. Among the tourists, the numbers of Indian travels were the highest. Likewise, the share of total Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in tourism stood at 11.47 per cent at Rs 23,855.50 million in 2018.
The hospitality sector has shown immense promise with several international hotel chains having already entered or in the process of entering the market.
The Visit Nepal Year 2020 is set to achieve the government agenda to recognise and accelerate the development of the potential of the tourism industry in the years to come even as the government creates ease of doing business for investors’ and stakeholders’ with incentives and subsidy provisions, supportive policies, political stability and sound governance.
On the occasion, PHDCCI – through its 1,30,00 members – and through its counterparts including Federation of Karnataka Chamber of Commerce and India (FKCCI), Bangalore Chamber of Industry and Commerce (BCIC),  India Association of Tour Operators (IATO), Travel Agents Association of India (TAII) and South India Hotel and Restaurant Association (SIHRA), ensured an outreach to over half-million industry entities.
On the occasion, economic minister at the Embassy of Nepal in New Delhi Nita Pokhrel Aryal, economic counselor at the Embassy of Nepal in New Delhi Tirtha Poudel, director at the Department of Tourism in Government of Karnataka K N Ramesh, managing director of the Nepal SBI Bank Anukool Bhatnagar, president of the Federation of Karnataka Chamber of Commerce and Industry (FKCCI) C R Janardhana,  president of Bangalore Chamber of Industry and Commerce (BCIC) Devesh Agarwal, chairman of Karnataka State Chapter of India Association of Tour Operators (IATO) S Mahalingaiah, honourary secretary of Travel Agents Association of India (TAAI) Niranjan S Bhargava, and executive director at the Interstate Multi-Modal Transport (Pvt) Ltd Bikas Rauniyar, principal director at the PHDCCI Dr Ranjeet Mehta, and deputy secretary and Nodal Coordinator at the SDC/India-Nepal Centre Atul Kumar Thakur also took active part in the discussions.

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