Nepal offers stable investment opportunities to foreign investors: Minister

Fri, Apr 20, 2012 12:00 AM on Others, Others,

KATHMANDU, April 20: 

Commerce Minister Lekh Raj Bhatta, addressing the thirteenth United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD XIII), said that the country was ready to offer a stable investment environment to foreign investors with peace process gradually coming to a logical conclusion.

According to a press release issued on Thursday by the Permanent Mission of Nepal to the United Nations in Geneva, Bhatta said that despite visible constraints, Nepal offers very attractive and stable investment opportunities in hydroelectricity and tourism sectors. 

The conference, which kicked off on Thursday in the Qatari capital of Doha, focuses on economic development and modernization of least developed countries (LDCs). 

“Service sector is emerging as a vibrant component of Nepali economy in recent years and its share in the gross domestic production, employment generation and foreign exchange earnings is increasing,” the release quotes Bhatta as saying during the conference. 

Underscoring multiple constraints LDCs like Nepal face in the development process of the service sector, including high transaction costs, supply-side problems, stringent market access conditions, inequalities, and formidable structural problems, Bhatta stressed that effective national efforts and adequate and appropriate international support are essential to overcome the deep-rooted challenges.

“Support measures should encompass special treatment for LDCs in the WTO negotiations on trade, and special priority should be accorded to modes and sectors of export interest to the LDCs,” says the statement.

Source: Republica