<img width="800" height="356" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221114131144/637238989c7e80680e0c7394jpeg.jpg" alt=""/>Edited excerpts from the 'Geopolitics and Economic Diplomacy' session during Kantipur Conclave 9-10 September with Swarnim Wagle, former vice-president of the National Planning Commission and development economist Prof Mahendra P Lama who is leading a team to prepare India’s North East Region Vision 2035. Swarnim Wagle: Let’s start with connectivity, which everyone is talking about in Nepal. Even in India, Narendra Modi has emphasised it. There are different forms of connectivity, physical, energy, digital, citizen-to-citizen connectivity.Mahendra P Lama: Connectivity is now of primary importance. China is building connectivity projects in Africa. India is also talking about connectivity. There are visible and invisible connectivity plans moving forward.Historically in Nepal, it was King Mahendra who first raised the issue of landlocked Nepal’s direct access to the sea during the 1964 United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). He repeated that in Kabul in 1970. India was angry that a subject of bilateral concern should be raised on the international stage, and blockaded Nepal in 1970. India only allowed the movement of milk, salt, medicines and kerosene across the border into Nepal.I accompanied Indian Prime Minister Indra Kumar Gujral when he visited Nepal in 1997. He opened the Phulbari corridor so that Nepalis could travel across India to Bangladesh. The Asian Highway is 25km away from Kakadvitta, from there, you can go directly to Dhaka, Chittagong, and the Indian north-east from Bangladesh’s ports.Similarly, the road to Shillong from Dawaki Tamabil in Meghalaya was also opened, as was the road to Akhora, Tripura and Bangladesh.The Indian government is now building a 'trilateral highway' to connect South-East Asia under the 'Look East Policy'. In two years you will not have to fly to Siliguri, Gauhati, Manipur, Burma and Thailand, there will be highway connections, opening up opportunities for business, tourism, healthcare and education.Eastern Nepal occupies 17% of Nepal's area with 14 districts, and a population of 4.5 million. East Nepal can have a corridor from Chiwa Bhanjyang to West Sikkim. Then from Gazing, Soren in West Sikkim, one can go directly to Taplejung from the north to Pathibhara. It will be beneficial economically as well as for pilgrims. Nepal has a chance to play a big role in this. Swarnimji, you have released the new book The Great Upheaval, which also talks about connectivity at the local and regional level. The idea is different in different parts of the world. What is the difference between their thinking, and our thinking here at the local and regional level?Swarnim Wagle: Connectivity is not just about economic development, but also involves geopolitics, the competition between China and India. Bangladesh has struck a good balance in this regard. When I reviewed China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), I found that it expanded first from the strategy of 'Going Out' in 1999. After 2013, it came out as the BRI concept with Xi Jinping. That was when China aggressively moved ahead and emerged as a kind of ‘power broker’.The global economic recession of 2008 was a 'trigger'. China invested all its trade surplus in American Treasury Bonds. After this, interest rates fell sharply, becoming negative. The 'surplus' was invested in BRI. China began producing cement, aluminum, glass, construction material, and the demand for these products from developing countries led to the rise of China.From 2008 till Covid in 2019, China's two major banks, Exim Bank and China Development Bank, had become institutions comparable to the World Bank. Looking at the 10-year figure, there was $462 billion in accumulated debt. In some years, these two Chinese banks invested more in loans than international financial institutions including the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, and the African Development Bank. It reached a high point in 2016. Both banks alone had $75 billion in loan investments.The BRI was discussed in Nepal in 2017, but along came Covid-19. It is now on hold, but it looks like it will come in a new form, a BRI 2.0 with a focus on technology.Even if it is directly China, it can involve BRI multilaterally. This would reduce risk. After all, the main investors are these two banks. China does not have unlimited resources, but banks have non-performing loans. It was 5% in 2010 and now it is 65%. There were random loan investments which borrowers also abused, as seen in the Philippines.Maybe China will keep Pokhara Airport in BRI. Otherwise, we will be left out of this whole process. Now we have to join BRI 2.0, but on our own terms.Mahendra P Lama: You talked about BRI 2.0. BRI has a plan called China-Pakistan Economic Corridor from Gwadar port on the Arabian Sea to Balochistan, Sindh, Punjab, Kashmir all the way to Gilgit, Baltistan, up to Xinjiang through Kashgar. By building this railway, China will influence the culture, agriculture and natural resources there. There is no other example of China entering other countries like this.In Xinjiang, there is trouble. There are militants in Pakistan, connectivity could also mean that China will be importing insecurity. Beijing is taking a calculated risk here, they think that the returns are big enough to take the risk. Most of the 55-60 CPEC projects that China is working on within Pakistan are related to energy like electricity, coal, oil.Could all this bring a new kind of nationalism to Nepal and Sri Lanka? In international relations, it is called 'resource nationalism'. African nations are saying that they will not allow anyone to take their water, forest, or coal. Nepal could be in a similar situation to Sri Lanka. What will China do?Swarnim Wagle: China came to challenge the western development model that was in place for more than a century. Initially the west did not pay much attention and called it 'neo-colonialism'. Recently Chinese workers have been chased away in Angola, Kenya, Tanzania, and Zambia. China paused the entire BRI in 2019 to address the issues.We should also learn from the experience in the neighborhood. Let's leave Africa aside and take Sri Lanka. Chinese investment there was in the non-trade sector. When things went downhill with the bombings in Colombo in 2019, then the Covid-19 crisis, the Russo-Ukraine war, its foreign revenue plummeted, and they could not pay back loans. Added to that were policy mistakes and government arrogance.High cost loans are risky. As soon as there is a change in an external factor, whether Covid-19 or war, things can go south fast. Internal disorder can also make things difficult. We have to be aware of this.In Nepal, China is always looked at as a counterbalance to India, and people compare China and India. However, things are changing, the Nepali media has started to talk about the Tatopani border being closed. They are also talking about transparency in Chinese loans. The debate has started at a community level.On the good side, China seems to be taking these things in its stride and practicing covert diplomacy by gradually using its soft power, and then hard power. All this is a bit new for us.Mahendra P Lama: The biggest challenge for Nepal, Bangladesh and Pakistan is that China is working on geopolitics and economic diplomacy. On the other hand, all these countries have an established and close relationship with India, which cannot be compared with China. In India, we have Indian Gorkha troops, citizens of Nepal have gone to India and settled down and vice versa. So the big concern is how will Nepal balance all this with China.You have worked in the government of Nepal. How can Nepal strike that balance between its two giant neighbours?Swarnim Wagle: For that we need enlightened leadership.  There is an interesting anecdote in BP Koirala’s autobiography. While visiting China, he met Mao Zedong at 11 o'clock at night. Mao asked, How much is India giving you?BP said – About Rs200 millionMao said - Then we will give 160 million from our side. Since you need to maintain your relationship with India, we cannot give more than them.Even our neighbor China was thinking of what was best for Nepal. Now things have changed, of course. But we should be thinking of win-win relations.Multilateral relations with India should move forward, but China has advanced a lot in terms of infrastructure, new technology, and artificial intelligence. It is even ahead of the West in some cases. We are far behind, only ahead of Afghanistan in this region. China’s assistance is vital.Both the countries have their own strategic interests. But we should balance both of them and not put them against each other. B P Koirala managed it well. In the beginning, King Mahendra also struck a balance, although later, he tried to pit Delhi and Beijing against each other. Gyanendra tried to do the same thing, and it didn't work.Both are emerging powers, and we can move forward by keeping both their security concerns in mind. Mao thought of Nepal’s interest, but we need to have leadership in Nepal that is looking out for the national interest. My question to you is: Sri Lanka oscillates between India and China, as do the Maldivians, but Bangladesh has been able to maintain that delicate balance?Mahendra P Lama: Once, I was speaking to Ambassador Bhesh Bahadur Thapa. He told me about the instance when he accompanied Prime Minister Kirtinidhi Bista to China. On arrival at the airport, Mao Zedong gave the three of them an overcoat, hats and gloves. They were surprised. But when they came out of the airport, it was so cold that the clothes they brought from Nepal would have been of no use. Similarly, when Tenzing Sherpa climbed Everest, he was felicitated in India. When he met Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, Tenzing told him that he had been invited to England.After the gala that night, Nehru handed him an overcoat, hat and gloves saying, “How can you withstand the cold in London in these clothes?”Diplomacy starts with such small things. Bangladesh did not look to anyone on how they could balance India and China. They followed a strategy that worked for them.In the 1990s, when Deng Xiaoping introduced the idea that "it doesn't matter whether a cat is white or black, as long as it catches mice”, what he meant was that it does not matter who comes, as long as they can take China out of economic stagnation.” The Cultural Revolution of 1966 to 1976 had pushed China off the cliff.  At that time their biggest enemy was Japan. But they brought Japan in, which in turn brought in investment, helping to reduce poverty. They did the same with the Americans. And it was only when China became economically strong that the rivalry started.  Look at India, on the one hand they support the Indo-Pacific alliance together with the US. On the other hand, they sidelined the Indo-Pacific during the war between Ukraine and Russia. What India needs is gas and oil, and they made their foreign policy accordingly.If India had not struck that balance, the petrol Nepal imports from India would by now have cost Rs400 a litre. Nepal should also learn from such a balanced diplomacy.India does not recognise BRI because China is treating Kashmir as a part of CIPEC without asking India. China created the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) in 2016 to advance the BRI, and India also became its member. By 2022 India had brought in 20 projects worth $5 billion through AIIB. This is the kind of geostrategic balance where national interest is prioritised.When it comes to national interest, one has to go all in to reap the maximum benefit. Nepal should do that. Swarnim Wagle: The relationship between Sheikh Hasina and Narendra Modi also shows how mutual trust and respect between leaders can help advance bilateral relationships. Bangladesh was born in 1971 with the help of India, but for decades there was mistrust. It has melted away now. But Bangladesh is also bringing in investment from China, which in turn is benefiting India.India made the Hambantota port in Sri Lanka a big issue, and partly because of this there was regime change in Colombo and the downfall of the Rajapaksas. But Hambantota port built with Chinese loans is currently being used most extensively by Indian car companies. Neighbors can also benefit from infrastructure that we build in Nepal.Mahendra P Lama: Interestingly, China has adopted the same policy as the US to continue its hegemony in the world. The US gave foreign aid and invested heavily to make others dependent on them. They adopted the policy to threaten and fight when that dependence was challenged. We call it the dependency threshold. China is just doing the same.They made others dependent on them like in Sri Lanka and even India. When India’s trade deficit with China increased from $270 million in 1990 to $120 billion now, they attacked eastern Ladakh. Such games are played in international relations, some overtly, some covertly.Now my question, the model of development that we adopted in the hills has failed. Look at Darjeeling, what did farming tea for 160 years do? The world drank the tea every morning for Rs6, the tea plantation workers were paid Rs 230 daily. The owners jet around the world and the workers have no savings.Hydroelectric power is generated in the mountains. The water is ours, the displaced people are ours, the land is ours, the environment is ours, everything is ours, but the electricity is everyone else’s, the profit earned from electricity is someone else’s. Look at cardamom, traders sell it at Rs4,000 per kg whereas the farmers get Rs200 per kg. The further it gets from Sikkim’s border, the more costly cardamom becomes. You have been in the Planning Commission, what is Nepal’s take on this?Swarnim Wagle:  You were born in Sikkim and I was born in Gorkha so we both know the situation of the mountains. When Prime Minister Modi came to Nepal he said that ‘the mountains cannot hold water and youth”. Even today people in my village have to work 16 hours a day to afford two meals a day. People are leaving the hinterland in droves for better opportunities. We descended to Chitwan from Gorkha, then further afield because of malaria. Now 52% of Nepal’s population live in the plains.We had to walk for hours to get water in the hills, in Chitwan we had water in our backyard. Life was easier. But we need to think about the mountains too. There should be better education, healthcare, and more importantly connectivity. Why would I live in Kathmandu if I could go to Gorkha in half an hour?The per capita income of mountain villages from Ilam to Baitadi is now in the range of Rs1,200. When it reaches Rs3,500 to 4,000, middle-income Nepalis will climb the mountains in search of their second homes.We often say that the villages have been abandoned. But the 2011 census shows that there has been rapid migration in 21 villages, the number has increased in the recent census. Some 80% of Nepal's population lives along Mahendra Highway, Kathmandu, Pokhara, Dang and Prithvi Highway.While we think of the resources as our own, the truth is that capital and the market are outside. We should think about how locals can get maximum benefits like giving communities a share in hydropower.Mahendra P Lama: But it is also true that others have progressed using what is ours. Bangladesh was built with our stones. If you stand in the Phulbari Corridor, you can see trucks carrying stones from Himalayan quarries to Bangladesh. Why haven’t we been able to utilise our own resources? We have to buy stone and sand. India’s new policy is to generate electricity in the North-East and sell it all over South-East Asia. But why sell it at a cheaper rate, why not add value, and look for markets with higher profit? Currently Sikkim has the highest per capita income in India at Rs425,000. But we are not clear on things. We need to create a value chain for ginger, cardamom and tiger grass.Swarnim Wagle: You talked about organic products which require minimal infrastructure. But they are doing better than that: up to 25,000 youth are engaged in software development. In 70 years we have increased our exports to $1 billion, but we are earning more than that through the IT sector.Mahendra P Lama: Nepal should now give up its old identity. A nation sitting in the lap of Mt Everest, all smiling, bright-faced friendly Nepalis, brave Nepalis. All that's fine. But now Nepal needs to reposition itself. No other country can play the role Nepal has to play in the Himalayan region on the climate crisis -- Nepal should stand up and take charge of the knowledge, discussion, and concern. It can change Nepal’s image, make it an intellectual leader in the world.Read the <a href="https://www.himalkhabar.com/news/132137">excerpts</a> in Nepali at <a href="https://www.himalkhabar.com">himalkhabar.com</a>.

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Nepal needs to rebrand itself

The daily 10-hour curfew at Tribhuvan International Airport from 8 November that will last five months has affected tourism during Nepal’s peak season, with some hotels and trekking agencies here reporting cancellations into spring next year. The reduced hours at Nepal’s main aviation gateway till 31 March means that a third of all flights have been cut. This has also caused ticket prices to surge by up to eight times of normal fares. For example a Kathmandu-Delhi ticket that used to cost Rs12,000 is now listed at Rs50,000, and even then seats are not available.&nbsp; “Especially if they are here to trek, change in flight dates can cause tourists to miss their connections,” says Jagan Timilsina, who runs a trail running and outdoor education business. &nbsp; Pokhara is feeling the brunt as hotels report last-minute cancellations for November because of flight disorders. Some hoteliers also say although there have been some cancelled trips, most itineraries have been rescheduled.&nbsp; Hari Prasad Sharma Gaire of the local chapter of the Hotel Association of Nepal says the Kathmandu airport closure should have been timed for the off-season. He told us: “Starting construction during the peak tourist season was a mistake and will cause the tourism industry to lose a lot of business. The upgrade could have been spread out over a longer time but closed for fewer hours at night so that disruption was minimal.”&nbsp; Nearly a third of the 1.2 million tourists who visit Nepal annually come to Pokhara, which is also the gateway to Mustang, the Annapurna treks and pilgrimage tourism to Muktinath. Located by scenic lakes with a range of adventure sports like hot air ballooning, paragliding, canyoning, bungee and ziplines, Pokhara is also popular among diaspora Nepalis. “Besides its own attractions, Pokhara is really the hub for central Nepal, and we have been trying to get visitors to extend their stay here,” says Timilsina, who started out as a trekking porter and rose up the ranks to be an expedition guide and entrepreneur. &nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2024111603114_0e071ce63ea9b0a9a7ee76f8c3cea0ff08c6767c41dd09f6bc4413d2db067a60.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="2024111603114_0e071ce63ea9b0a9a7ee76f8c3cea0ff08c6767c41dd09f6bc4413d2db067a60" data-rendition-name="original" width="3500" height="2333" loading="lazy" alt="Pokhara's tourism woes NT"> <figcaption>Tourist arrivals in Pokhara have slumped since the disruptions at Kathmandu airport due to upgrading work. Photo: KRISHNA MANI BARAL/NEPALI TIMES ARCHIVE</figcaption> </figure>  Even without the Kathmandu airport closure affecting tourist arrivals, Pokhara was already suffering from a decline due to many factors like the poor state of the Prithvi Highway, the shortage of luxury accommodation for high-end tourists, and the reluctance of international airlines to start direct flights to Pokhara despite an expensive new airport that was inaugurated two years ago.&nbsp; “There was a lot of initial excitement on the construction of the international airport,” says Timilsina, “but it hasn’t delivered as expected due to politics. People have invested in nearby businesses, and have faced losses.” India has blocked direct flights from its cities to Pokhara because the facility was built by a Chinese company. Although tourists and pilgrims from India hit record levels this year, the poor state of the highways and the Indian bus accident on the highway to Kathmandu in July that killed 27 pilgrims from Maharashtra state dampened arrival figures. Gaire says, “While tourist arrivals to Pokhara are now approaching pre-Covid levels, we haven’t seen the improvement we were expecting. We need a better marketing strategy. What are our embassies abroad doing?”&nbsp; Indeed, Pokhara used to be a favourite destination for Chinese tourists. There was a boom in arrivals from China before Covid, especially after a popular Chinese tv serial was shot on location here. But arrivals from China have not really recovered since the pandemic because of the economic slowdown there. Promoting Pokhara airport to handle direct flights from Chengdu or Kunming could revive Chinese arrivals.&nbsp; Nepal’s Civil Aviation Authority (CAAN) has used the Kathmandu airport closure as an excuse to arm-twist international airlines to start flying to Bhairawa, which has barely been in operation for two years since it was inaugurated. So far, Fly Dubai, Thai AirAsia, Jazeera and Qatar are flying to Bhairawa, but most use it as a hop before flying on to Kathmandu, which does not reduce congestion at Kathmandu.&nbsp; An ideal situation could have been to get Pokhara to run to full capacity while Kathmandu is partially out of action. Pokhara entrepreneurs are puzzled why the CAAN and the national government have not taken more interest in promoting Pokhara as an alternative to reduce the congestion in Kathmandu. Nepal’s football team that was flying to Dushanbe this week couldn’t get tickets via Delhi, and took a domestic flight to Bhadrapur, crossed over to Bagdogra and flew on to Delhi to catch their flight to Tajikistan.

Pokhara’s tourism woes

An excerpt of a conversation between an anthropologist and linguist Mark Turin, PhD and Lava Deo Awasthi, PhD, the first Chairperson of the Language Commission of Nepal. Nepali Times: What is the role of Nepal’s Language Commission and when was it formed? Lava Deo Awasthi: The Constitution of Nepal (2015) created a Language Commission (LC) with the following four core mandates: (a) to develop eligibility criteria for gaining status as an official language and offer recommendations to the Government of Nepal about the official language(s) in each province; (b) to offer recommendations to the Government about measures to be taken for the conservation, promotion, and development of languages; (c) to suggest possible ways of using mother tongues in education by assessing their stage of development; and, (d) to conduct studies, carry out research and perform monitoring functions about the response to the constitutional provisions for the federalisation of languages in Nepal. The Commission was founded in 2016 and I was appointed as the Chairperson of the Commission in September of the same year by the Cabinet of Ministers. What in your own professional and educational background helped to prepare you for the role? I have worked with the Government of Nepal for about 30 years, alongside holding teaching appointments at universities in Nepal. Prior to assuming the role of the Chairperson of the Commission, I served as permanent Secretary to the Government of Nepal and worked as the Chief Administrator of the Central Development Region. I was appointed as Director General of the Department of Education and completed my assignments as Joint Secretary at the Planning, Monitoring and Educational Administration Divisions of the Ministry of Education.&nbsp; In addition, I have taught courses as a visiting professor at Tribhuvan University and Kathmandu University for more than three decades. Later, I also started supervising MPhil and PhD students at the Far Western University in Mahendranagar, Kanchanpur. My PhD project from the Danish University of Education was dedicated to making sense of Nepal’s social construct and commitment to multilingualism, exploring the persistence of monolingual school practices in the face of constitutional promises and state commitments to multilingualism. I conducted a survey of Nepal’s languages and carried out a qualitative study of the Tharu language in the district of Bardia. I analysed language policy statements and explored classroom pedagogies in schools. I documented how teachers showed a tendency to resist change and maintain the status quo because they were not consulted when new educational language policies were introduced. Teachers also exhibited a deeply-held adherence to the Gurukul education system which appears to have been harnessed as a way to resist newer pedagogical ideologies imported from the West. Recognising how engrained these rich traditions of knowledge transmission are, I wanted to know how students’ engagement in the learning process appeared to have dwindled, creating a gap between children’s home languages and the language(s) of the school. Whilst statutory provisions for education in the mother tongue were oriented towards promotion, classroom pedagogies remained resolutely monolingual and exclusionary. The result was that multilingual education policies that had been introduced in Nepal did not result in meaningful changes in classroom practices. My research was also a reflection of childhood traumas I had experienced at the earliest stage of formal education. My home language, Baitadeli, has a strong oral tradition and no written literature. English is my fifth language in terms of exposure and competence, and my home district of Baitadi is well-known for its loyalty to the local language. I had to drop out of school after completing my sixth grade. Staying at home, I received much attention from my family and had much greater exposure to my native language, culture and environment. My overall impression is that dropping out of school had a surprisingly positive impact on my life. The opportunity offered a surprising dividend for me as I gained mastery in my mother tongue and received extensive exposure to folk literature and Indigenous knowledge and survival skills, cultivating my interest in language, culture, literature and local cosmologies.&nbsp; Now that I reflect on it, I appreciate how language has always played a key role in my life. I grew up in a multilingual environment: brought up with Baitadeli, Hindi, Sanskrit, Nepali and English. Language played a major part in my decision to leave school and my later success is closely linked to my competence in several languages. It was rewarding to be at home with my family as I deepened my understanding of native language and culture, which in turn helped me to harness and refine my art of living. Languages matter so much to me because they are both software and hardware. Later, when I was in secondary school, I realised that my command of my home language contributed significantly to enhancing my Nepali and English. I used my mother tongue as a form of linguistic capital to strengthen my competence in both English and Nepali.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2024111811110_5400ba54792bf9e4854e1c1effde8bf09804e99647f23513700b450cc49adc4a.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="2024111811110_5400ba54792bf9e4854e1c1effde8bf09804e99647f23513700b450cc49adc4a" data-rendition-name="original" width="1000" height="1500" loading="lazy" alt="Dr Lava Deo Awasthi"> </figure>  In your term as the Commission’s first Chairperson, what were your strategic goals and objectives? My first strategic goal was to create an environment conducive to implementing the provisions of the Constitution of Nepal in relation to language. My priority was to prepare a detailed action plan for my six-year tenure in consultation with language stakeholders, including language experts, professionals, activists, Indigenous community members and representatives of relevant national and local-level institutions. The Commission formed a body of high-level advisors to ensure that the Chairperson’s work was well-informed and credible. The advisors to the committee had highly visible professional and social reputations in Nepal and had much experience in the field of language conservation, promotion, research and development. Another strategy we adopted was to establish close institutional linkages with federal, provincial, and local level governments for collecting opinions and disseminating information widely.&nbsp; What critical issues did you have to consider while discharging your duty? When Nepal’s new Constitution was drafted, a number of concerns could not be adequately addressed. These related to the conservation of languages, the recognition of official languages at the provincial level, and the use of mother tongues at federal, provincial, and local levels. These unresolved issues and matters pertaining to the federalizsation of Nepal’s languages were passed on to the Language Commission to address and resolve.&nbsp; Regarding the recommendations for official languages, a five-year timeline had been set by the Constitution. With great effort, we succeeded in having all provinces agree to recognise their official languages as per the recommendations of the Commission.&nbsp; What were your greatest achievements during your term? One of the greatest achievements was that we succeeded in setting a language agenda at all levels. Nepal’s language communities and other stakeholders expressed the view that this was the first time their languages were recognised and their voices heard by the state. People participated in debates and discussed issues relating to language that in all likelihood had never before happened in their lifetimes, at least not in ways that were supported by the state. We encouraged people to speak in their own language(s) and provided translators during plenary sessions and group discussions. Another major achievement was developing criteria for the status planning of languages at federal, provincial, and local levels, and to recommend 11 province-level official languages, in addition to the Nepali language. Similarly, a notable achievement was recognising Indigenous languages spoken by smaller communities, all of whom faced ongoing marginalisation and high levels of endangerment. The Commission identified 9 new languages that had not been reported in the 2011 census, and provided a framework for recognising official languages within a municipality. The commission emphasised the need for documentation and digitisation of languages for developing corpora and archives at national and sub-national levels.&nbsp; Languages of historical importance as well as classical languages were given recognition for their protection, growth, and development. Recommendations were made for the conservation, promotion and development of Nepal’s marginalised languages that are threatened by majority languages and for those languages that hold particular power at local and global levels. Recommendations were also made for how best to safeguard Nepal’s languages from the ever-growing spread of English and other powerful, globalising languages.&nbsp; A further important aspect of the Commission’s work was to emphasise mother tongue medium instruction in schools across the nation. Recognising the role of language in children’s cognitive, socio-emotional and academic development, the Commission suggested strategies for linking schools with ward-level language clusters for use in the classroom. The importance of nurturing and respecting a child’s first language was reiterated in the Commission’s recommendations for children’s learning and all-round development. By the end of my term, a remarkable change could be observed in terms of building trust within and across Nepal’s diverse language communities. A network of language groups and stakeholders across the country proved to be a powerful way of bringing all language communities under one roof for a collective review of and response to the process of federalising language policy. The many language stakeholders across Nepal appreciated the opportunity to work within a coordinated framework, and—feeling empowered by this—seemed genuinely enthusiastic about the initiatives taken by the Commission.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2024111811114_b45297fdd2fedf17bdb6313e495a1062c0d87f1a19fa5349f871f220b75f93ab.jpg" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="2024111811114_b45297fdd2fedf17bdb6313e495a1062c0d87f1a19fa5349f871f220b75f93ab" data-rendition-name="original" width="1500" height="1000" loading="lazy" alt="Dr Lava Deo Awasthi NT"> </figure>  What were the most significant challenges for you as Chairperson? One of the major challenges was winning people’s trust in advocating for the mission of the Language Commission. I faced considerable resistance as I sought to emphasise the use of native languages in families and communities. While the Commission advocated for multilingualism and promoted linguistic diversity, the prevailing policy circles and central level institutions had been deeply influenced by a one-language discourse and ideology of Nepali only. The spread of English also poses a huge threat to Nepal’s languages. However, people in power do not seem to see this as a problem. They tend to abandon their own languages in preference for English. The way that Nepal’s municipalities are increasingly introducing English as a medium of instruction at the earliest stage of a child’s school-based education has proven to be detrimental to their cognitive development, socio-emotional wellbeing and academic success. Most of Nepal’s elites have been heavily influenced by the spread of English and remain unaware about its impact on their home languages as well as on the inter-generational transmission of Indigenous languages in the country. I wish that we could have produced more compelling evidence to show the consequences of making poor policy choices for our children’s education. Demystification calls for a collective response. To make change happen across this entire, complex and federalising country was daunting work and left like a race against time. I feel that I could have done more to offer concrete examples in favour of using the mother tongue as a medium of children’s education at the earliest stages of a child’s education. What do you see the Language Commission achieving in the next 5-10 years? The Language Commission will have to ensure that all of its key recommendations are implemented at all levels of government. In 10 years’ time, all seven of Nepal’s provinces will have their official languages in place. These languages will also be recognised as languages of federal business, alongside Nepali. I anticipate that all official languages in the federal and provincial systems will have a national portal for inter-language corpora using machine translation to fulfil their federal, provincial and local level language functions, and that all languages spoken in Nepal will be represented through a digital database in the national archive. The Office of Statistics will monitor the status of Nepal’s languages over time. By the end of the next decade, each municipality in the country will have recognised one or two official languages at the local level, based on speech populations. Other local languages will have received community-level legal recognition and official status to fulfil their functional roles. Languages that are highly endangered or at risk will be entitled to receive state grants for enhancing local level capabilities to encourage families and young learners to speak the language. Incentive schemes will be introduced in municipalities that promote language within the family and at home. Inter-generational transmission of languages will have received welcome and timely attention across Nepal. It is my hope that all schools—public and private—will have introduced mother tongue medium instruction at the earliest stage of school education, at least up to class five. Nepali, English and other national as well as classical and foreign languages will be taught as subjects. The existing policy of English medium education at the early stage of education will be abolished. The Government of Nepal will be held accountable if the number of speakers of any language decreases or if local communities face language loss and greater endangerment. Under the aegis of the Language Commission, a Centre for Language Research and Innovation will be created with world-class facilities for language documentation and archiving in collaboration with Tribhuvan University’s Central Department of Linguistics and other relevant institutions. Harnessing the vastness of Nepal’s linguistic diversity, the Language Commission will morph into a centre of excellence for national and international communities to engage in collaborative language research, to share experiences and document best practices at in service of global linguistic diversity and Nepal’s many Indigenous languages.

Languages are both software and hardware

Turkish Airlines has introduced a new amenity kit collection designed in collaboration with French fashion house Lanvin for international business class passengers on flights more than five hours. It consists of five pieces designed for sustainability and elegance. Bags are reusable and will consist of Lanvin cosmetic products like hand and body lotions and lip balm. Eye masks and socks are made from recycled materials, earplugs are packaged in paper and the toothbrush is bamboo.

Turkish amenity kit

Earlier this month, Nepal received Rs1.6 billion from the World Bank as part of its <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/will-nepal-ever-be-paid-for-saving-trees">Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF)</a>, rewarding the country for increasing its carbon sink capacity. Nepal is the first in South Asia to benefit from this facility, and it is specifically to recompense the country for increasing forest cover in 13 Tarai districts between 2018-2024. “We are also trying to get another Rs13 billion from the facility while also preparing for free market-based carbon trading in the international market,” says Nabaraj Pudasaini of the REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries) Implementation Centre. Big emitters of greenhouse gases are under pressure to reduce their carbon emissions, and many have signed agreements to do so by investing in decarbonisation projects in developing countries. Countries that emit more than a specified amount of carbon would be able to buy emission rights from countries that emit less. Nepal is internationally known for its community forestry program which has been largely credited for <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/tree-mendous">increasing tree cover to over 45%</a> in less than three decades. But this achievement had not been adequately recognised or rewarded internationally before. Forests, especially in the tropics, absorb and store large amounts of carbon while releasing oxygen in a process known as photosynthesis. <a href="https://www.fao.org/forest-resources-assessment/en/">Preventing deforestation</a> and increasing canopy cover is considered a much more achievable goal than reducing emission in the scale necessary to limit global average temperature to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. COP11 in Montreal in 2005 first proposed reducing carbon emissions by improving forest quality by halting degradation. By 2015, a new mechanism of financial assistance was created to help less developed countries with sustainable management of forests <a href="https://www.un-redd.org/">(called REDD+)</a>. Under this new mechanism, countries receive aid based on their efforts to prevent forest degradation and increase carbon sink, and in 2021 the World Bank was entrusted with implementing it. Nepal’s FCPF receipt this month was calculated on the basis of 2.4 million tons of carbon stored at a rate of $5 per ton. In the second phase, Nepal will receive more than Rs4 billion within the next year for storing an additional 7 million tons of carbon. Eighty per cent of this amount obtained from carbon trading needs to be spent on local beneficiaries and indigenous communities.&nbsp; But carbon trading is not easy, Nepal needs to prove that protected forests will not be destroyed in future.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20241121091132_c8a381c9a95aa86fec558951650d97bb87914741f01766982ba2b086af001f16.jpg" data-media-id="editor_4" data-image-id="20241121091132_c8a381c9a95aa86fec558951650d97bb87914741f01766982ba2b086af001f16" data-rendition-name="original" width="1500" height="999" loading="lazy" alt="Greenbacks for greenery NT "> <figcaption>Photo: KUNDA DIXIT</figcaption> </figure>  Explains carbon trading expert Yugan Manandhar. “Forests should be handed over to the community and shown that they are managed sustainably. Proving this will be particularly challenging; forest encroachment and degradation is rife in the Tarai.” <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/multimedia/nepal-is-going-up-in-smoke">Deliberate forest fires</a> have also added to the challenge because they increase carbon emissions and reduce the sink capacity of forests. The basis for the amount that Nepal received was set five years ago by calculating the carbon reserves of forests in the 13 Tarai districts. In the meantime, sustainable forest management, tree plantation, forest destruction and erosion control were prioritised to increase carbon reserves in those forests. Nepal is signing another carbon trading agreement during the ongoing Baku climate conference. The <a href="https://www.leafcoalition.org/">Lowering Emissions by Accelerating Forest finance (LEAF Coalition) </a>proposes to sell the carbon stored in the forests of Bagmati, Gandaki and Lumbini provinces. For this, Nepal signed the letter of intent three years ago at COP26 in Glasgow. The target is to store 70 million tons of carbon in 32 million hectares of forest in the three provinces per which Nepal will receive Rs13 billion in four years at $10 per ton with provisions to increase the rate if various conditions are met. However, the agreement in itself doesn’t guarantee the amount. According to the targets set by Nepal, forest degradation should be stopped and carbon reserves increased by protecting tree cover. Preparations are also underway for clean air carbon trade because it has offset fossil fuel use by introducing 30,000 electric vehicles. Nepal has been selected for the first round to receive $40 million within one and a half years through the Clean Air System of the World Bank. Given that most of Nepal’s energy mix is from biomass, replacing them with electric stoves can significantly improve health by reducing indoor pollution as well as strengthen the country’s capacity for carbon trade. “Nepal's goal now is to sell carbon in the free market where carbon credits are bought and sold based on supply and demand in an open and transparent manner,” adds Pudasaini of the REDD Implementation Centre. “Nepal can now set its own price and bargain with interested buyer countries and organisations.” Lately, India has been discussing setting up a carbon market. Nepal has exported Rs12.72 billion worth of electricity to India so far this fiscal year, which can be traded under Nepal’s carbon market. “Carbon trading can create significant economic benefits for Nepal, which will help reinvest in development and environmental protection projects,” says Manandhar. “But we must prioritise sustainable management of forests, cutting older trees and allowing regrowth as well as promoting electric stoves and electric vehicles.”

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