Jobs key to sustained growth: FM

Kathmandu, July 30

The government has embraced the policy for the promotion of start-ups, commercial agriculture and small and medium enterprises to create jobs in the aftermath of the coronavirus pandemic, said Minister for Finance Dr. Yuba Raj Khatiwada.

"Start-ups, new business ideas and innovations have to be supported and informal activities should be formalised to create better employment opportunities in the country," he said while inaugurating 'Aba Deshmai Chha Rojgari' (Now employment is available in the country) campaign on Thursday.

He said that jobs were critical for sustained economic growth and development while skilled jobs were crucial for raising productivity and empowering people.

Maintaining that employment was the best form of social protection for those in working age and ability, Dr. Khatiwada said that therefore it was the top development agenda.

He also said that there was a challenge to develop entrepreneurship, self-employment and risk-taking capacity among the entrepreneurs in the country.

Since the private sector is the major job creator, the government is constantly making efforts to make the tax and financial policies conducive to businesses that create jobs, he said. "The government is ready to work with private sector and development partners in this regard."

According to him, reducing the cost of doing business for private sector, particularly institutional, regulatory and infrastructure related ones, has always been in government priority.

"We have about 4 million workers abroad and a large number of youth also go to India for seasonal works. With a view that their return should not create employment crisis at home, the budget for this year has prioritised jobs as the second most important agenda next to controlling the coronavirus and saving life," he said.

 

Dr. Khatiwada said that higher budget was earmarked for creation of more jobs, in both wage and self-employment areas.

"Skilling and re-skilling trainings, on the job trainings, labour market information bank, capital, insurance and interest rate subsidies to self-employment schemes, more resources to job creating organisations through monetary and fiscal transfers, expansion of contributory social security schemes, encouraging firms to use domestic workers through various incentives based or coercive measures are some of them," he said.

The 'Aba Deshmai Chha Rojgari' campaign is initiated by Rojgari Services Pvt. Ltd. and UKaid Skills for Employment Programme, and builds on earlier efforts to respond to the livelihood needs of migrant returnees and other economically disadvantaged and socially excluded groups.

Because of the loss in jobs in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, around 700,000 Nepali workers are expected to return from overseas over the next year alone.

Nepal needs to create over a million jobs to avoid an imminent unemployment crisis. “Our inability to respond to this crisis in time may have an adverse ripple effect across all sectors of the economy, reversing hard-won progress of recent decades,” said Baljit Vohra, Team Leader of UKaid SEP.

Rojgari Services will utilise its extensive platforms – website, mobile application, social media, Rojgari Pasals, Ghumti Rojgari Pasals, and collaborations – to connect and facilitate appropriate skilling, employment or self-employment pathways for registered returnee migrants.

Shailendra Raj Giri, founder of Rojgari Services and Mero Jobs, noted, “The campaign and our collective partnership, with UKaid SEP and others, can catalyse a collective movement to generate employments, enterprises, and facilitate growth for and by Nepal’s human resources.”

Published in The Rising Nepal daily on 31 July 2020.