Friday, November 16, 2018

Nepal to urge Japan to hire skilled workers


Kathmandu, Nov. 14: Nepal is planning to formally ask Japan to open the market for skilled and semi-skilled Nepali workers.

During the upcoming visit of Foreign Minister Pradeep Kumar Gyawali to Japan, Nepal will ask Japan to open the lucrative labour market for Nepali migrant workers.

Some of the Japanese organisations such as Japan Agriculture Exchange Council had expressed their desire to take Nepali youth as trainee workers in the past.

“We primarily would like to seek Japanese support in infrastructure development such as road, railways and hydroelectricity projects and ask for the latter’s support in the modernisation of agriculture. Employment of Nepali workers will also be an important agenda,” Gyawali said at a press briefing at the Ministry on Wednesday.

He said that the visit will try to revisit the bilateral relations between the two countries and find the new areas of cooperation.

“As the dependency on the Official Development Assistance (ODA) is gradually decreasing, we need to find the new financing mechanisms in order to fill the gap of infrastructure financing and achieve the development targets,” said Gyawali.

He will participate in an Investment seminar and interaction which will be attended by Japanese investors and businessmen where Nepal will present the potential investment areas and projects.

Chief Executive Officer of the Investment Board of Nepal Maha Prasad Adhikari will make a presentation on the investment opportunities in the country.

FM Gyawali is scheduled to embark on an official week-long visit of Japan from Saturday.

He said that the bar on Nepali women from working as domestic workers in the Gulf countries would not be lifted for the time being.

Indicating towards tightening the borders and forging more effective collaborations with the agencies like Nepal Police, the media and Maiti Nepal, the Foreign Minister said that diplomatic efforts were being made with India to save Nepali women from being trafficked.

He expressed his concerns to the Indian provision of visa need to Nepali citizens while coming to Nepal via India from some countries, and said that the matter would be resolved amicably through dialogue with India.

Talking about the delay in accepting the report of the Eminent Persons Group (EPG) on Nepal-India relations, he said that the report would be accepted soon by both the countries.

“There has been a delay in accepting the report. It was partly because of the busy schedule of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. But both the prime ministers will accept it soon and the report will go into implementation,” said Gyawali.

He said that as Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli and his Indian counterpart Modi had put their personal as well as institutional efforts to take the bilateral relations of the two neighbours to a new height in the modern context, all should hope that the relationship would be redesigned and redefined in the days to come.

FM Gyawali said that the government would appoint ambassadors to the remaining countries while the restructuring the Nepali missions abroad would also be on the cards.


Published in The Rising Nepal daily on 15 November 2018. 

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