High-level committee to followup investment commitment

Kathmandu, Mar. 5: The government has started the process to form a high-level committee to follow up on the commitments made by investors to pour in more than a trillion rupees during the Nepal Investment Summit held last week.

“The ministry is finalising the framework for forming a high-level committee for the follow-up. It will help the creation of other mechanisms as per the requirement,” said Shankar Prasad Koirala, Secretary at the Ministry of Industry (MoI).

Although the ministry said that it was yet to decide who would lead the committee, Minister for Industry Nabindra Raj Joshi had announced that he himself would lead the committee at the concluding ceremony of the Summit.

Chief Executive Officer of the Investment Board of Nepal (IBN) Maha Prasad Adhikari also said that work was underway to form an effective mechanism to translate the commitment of the investors into action.

“We are thinking of enhancing the capacity and number of human resources and financial resources for that purpose,” he said.

According to Adhikari, the investors have made an informed decision while expressing their investment intent in various industrial and business sectors. Therefore, the board will put every effort possible to materialise the commitments.  

The IBN is a single-window body established to facilitate large-scale investment in infrastructure and other industrial enterprises in the country.

The government is also formulating the rules for a one-door system to facilitate the investors.

Minister Joshi said that a separate structure would be created at the Department of Industry to facilitate the investors.

Investors from six countries – China, Bangladesh, Japan, the United Kingdom, Sri Lanka and India – had expressed their intent to pump in Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) of about US$ 13.52 billion (Rs. 1.35 trillion).

The amount is far higher than the expectation of the government and constitutes almost 58 per cent of the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

The government had hoped to bring in FDI worth Rs. 100 billion.

The investors have expressed their interest in hydroelectricity, airport, highway, mining, food, tourism, manufacturing, solar energy, steel plant and construction sector.

Chinese investors had committed the highest amount, $8.3 billion, Bangladesh $2.4, and Japan and the UK each $ 1 billion.

Sri Lanka committed $500 million and India $ 317 million.

Leaders of the three major political parties, including the main opposition CPN-UML, had expressed their commitment to give high priority to investment, both domestic and foreign, and given assurances of their support to promoting and facilitating investment in infrastructure and other pertinent sectors, which is a must for the country to fulfill its infrastructure gap and lead the country to a middle income country by 2030.  

Likewise, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport, Ministry of Energy, Nepal Rastra Bank and other concerned agencies have expressed their commitment to extend ever possible support in realising the intended investment.