Kathmandu, Feb. 14: President Bidya Devi Bhandari underscored the need of entrepreneurship for the economic transformation of society through employment generation.
"National, regional and international collaboration was needed for entrepreneurship development, skill-based training and vocational education," she said while addressing the Nepal Entrepreneurship Summit 2019 organised by the Confederation of Nepalese Industries (CNI) in collaboration with Bishal Media Group, Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Supplies (MoICS) and Ministry of Finance (MoF) on Thursday.
She said that the government should facilitate the youth who have innovative concepts with appropriate environment and financing facility and help them to be able to compete in the international market.
Saying that the export promotion was the main responsibility of the government she expressed hope that the laws required for the new federal structure would be formulated at the earliest so that the investors and businessmen wouldn't face trouble while doing business.
Govt and business should go together: PM
Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli said that the government was for the lively, vibrant and robust collaboration with the private sector.
"The government and the private sector must walk together. Let's work together and move ahead together. he government is ready address every demand of the private sector and investors," said the PM.
According to him, the government and private sector are working to support the economic development and growth in the new structure and system.
We are in a Investment Board Nepal (IBN) platform to create investment-friendly environment in the country by amending the existing laws or creating new ones, and attract Foreign Direct Investment in multiple sectors, said PM Oli.
He also said that the government had asked the private sector to crate the draft of business related laws or recommend the amendments in the provisions that are against the spirit of investment and business.
He said that the government was going to organise an innovation and research summit in the near future. "If we want to lead the country on the path of development, we must excel in science and technology and harness the information technology in production and processing," he said.
Maintaining that the transition to federal structure has been largely smooth in the past one year the PM said that the country had prepared strong foundations for the impressive economic growth and social development with the mobilisation of limited resources.
Provinces seeks support to develop industries
Industry ministers of the provinces said that though the subnational units were rich in natural resources, they were yet to tap on the potential.
"Karnali has a huge potential in tourism, hydroelectricity and herbal products but we have not been successful enough to attract private investment in those areas. We are formulating investment-friendly policies," said Minister for Industry of Sudurpaschim Province Maya Bhatta.
But she said that the federal government was not much supportive in assisting the provinces in attracting investment.
Minister Bhatta said that her province needed federal support in developing the industrial sector and attracting private investment from the domestic and foreign investors.
Similarly, Minister for Industry of Gandaki Province Bikash Lamsal also said that the central government should change its perspective to the provincial governments.
"There is a legal gap in many areas which has obstructed the true implementation of federalism," he said.
Minister Lamsal said that Gandaki was developing 20 new trekking routes including the Round Dhaulagiri Trekking and developing other tourism products with an aim of attracting about 2 million tourists by 2022.
Likewise, Minister for Industry of Province 3 Arun Prasad Nepal said that the government in the province is announcing tax waiver for the investors.
"Many reforms will be made to facilitate private sector investment in Province 3," he said.
Minister for Industry of Karnali Province Nanda Singh Budha urged the investors to invest in tourism, hydro and manufacturing industries in Karnali as it has low cost labour and raw material.
"We are proposing tax waiver for 10 years in private investment in hotel, manufacturing and herbal industries," he said.
Minister for Finance Dr. Yuba Raj Khatiwada said that the government would soon launch the one-door system in business registration to providing operation license and urged the provinces to copy the model to attract more investment.
The federal government is in the last stage to create infrastructure for the one-door investment permit system.
He said that there might be some problems in coordination between the federal and provincial governments as the federalism was still in the implementation phase.
Published in The Rising Nepal daily on 15 February 2019.
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