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On April 26, the government banned the import of 10 luxury items for three months, citing the economic crisis. Now the Ministry of Industries, Commerce and Supplies is planning to extend the ban period, a highly placed source at the ministry tells ApEx. 

Some economists and businesspersons say such a move goes against the spirit of free trade.

“The ban was imposed for a certain period. If this government believes in free trade and a competitive economy, it has no right to ban import of some select items,” says economist Ramesh Poudel.

He adds prohibiting imports means the risk of informal market proliferation, which will ultimately hurt the revenue collection. This risk is more present in a country like Nepal, which shares an open border with India.  

Out of 5,012 listed items of import, the government had banned only 10 items deeming them luxury goods. 

The source at the Supplies Ministry says a proposal to stay the ban is due to be tabled before the Cabinet. “It is now up to the Cabinet to make the decision,” the source tells ApEx. 

Rajesh Kumar Agrawal, vice-president of the Confederation of Nepalese Industries, says the government is promoting black-marketeering by banning imports of goods.

“The goods that are supposedly banned are still available in the market. Where are they coming from if not from illegal channels,” he says. 

Former Commerce Secretary Purushottam Ojha says it is not right to discriminate and ban certain goods without any valid reason.

“If the government was so concerned, why didn’t it ban the import of items like Guthka that are harmful to health?” 

Concerned importers and traders have urged the government to review its decision, or at least the items on the ban list. They say the decision was made without any study.

Dinesh Shrestha, vice-president of the Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry, says the government should review the list if it is planning to ban the so-called luxury goods.

“It should conduct a thorough study and consult the concerned importers before deciding to impose a ban,” he says.

Finance Ministry Spokesperson Dhundiraj Niraula says if a certain good is cheaper for Nepal to import than to manufacture in the country, there is no point banning its import. 

“The Supplies Ministry should study all aspects and implications of prohibiting import of goods before taking further decisions,” he says.

Kamalesh Agrawal, senior vice-president of Nepal Chamber of Commerce, suggests that the government come up with a strategy that is a win-win for all.  

“Nepal’s largest import is petroleum products. This is the right time for the government to curb their consumption by adopting electric vehicles,” he says. “I understand luxury goods are unnecessary during bad economic times. But that doesn’t give the government the right to enforce arbitrary bans without any study.”

Nepal reported 391 new Covid-19 cases on Wednesday.

According to the Ministry of Health and Population, 2, 562 swab samples were tested in the RT-PCR method, of which 340 returned positive. Likewise, 1, 419 people underwent antigen tests, of which 51 were tested positive.

The Ministry said that no one died of the virus in the last 24 hours. The Ministry said that 46 infected people recovered from the disease.

As of today, there are 2, 276 active cases in the country.

In a case of utter negligence by a drinking water bottling plant, insect larvae and algae has been found in a water jar produced by the plant at a time when cholera outbreak is feared in Kathmandu Valley.

This level of negligence was observed during the monitoring of various drinking water bottling plants operated at Jhaukhel, Changunarayan Municipality-3 in Bhaktapur district. The monitoring was conducted under the leadership of Assistant Chief District Officer Madhav Prasad Sharma.

The monitoring team of the District Administration Office, Bhaktapur has destroyed the old bottles and jars with layers of algae inside that were found in the course of monitoring the various drinking water manufacturing companies.

A team comprising representatives of the Department of Food Technology and Quality Control, the Consumers Federation, the District Cottage Industries Office, the Chamber of Commerce and Industry and stakeholder organizations, and journalists carried out the monitoring and found negligence on the part of drinking water bottling plants.

The District Administration Office conducted the monitoring after increasing public complaints that worms and algae was found inside the various brands of jars containing drinking water.

The assistant chief district officer Sharma said that old jars numbering in hundreds found in course of onsite monitoring have been destroyed. He said the water bottling plants committing such negligence have been reprimanded and legal action would be initiated if they repeated their negligence.

Sample of water has been collected from two water plants in course of the monitoring and the samples forwarded to the Department for lab examination.

A total of 37 rhinos have died in the Chitwan National Park (CNP) and its buffer zone in the last fiscal year 2021/22.

According to the CNP, two were killed due to poaching and the remaining due to natural causes. CNP Information Officer Ganesh Prasad Timalsina said that among the two rhinos killed in poaching, the horn and hooves of one was intact while those of the next one had been taken away by poachers.

Timalsina said among the dead rhinos, 18 were male, 14 female and the gender of five could not be ascertained. Most of the rhinos died due to old age, getting stuck in swamp, tiger attack and falling in ditches among others.

Altogether 33 rhinos had died in 2020/21 while 44 in 2019/20, the CNP said. CNP, sprawling across 932 square meters of area, has grassland across 10,497 hectare land. Depletion of those grasslands had also contributed to the declining number of rhinos in the CNP.

A total of 752 rhinos were recorded in Nepal in 2021. CNP is home to 694 of them.