By Our Reporter
The fear of coronoavirus and the nationwide lockdown imposed to control the pandemic has already snatched away jobs of many Nepalis, whereas the small businesses have been affected the most. In lack of operation of industries and businesses, the private sectors have demanded that they should be allowed to cut the salary of their workers by 50 per cent. The farmers have been unable to sell their produces like milk and vegetables. Moreover, many migrant Nepali workers working abroad are sure to lose their jobs due to COVID-19, and this will result in the decline in remittance. Works on projects have been halted and their completion period has been pushed further. Of course, the lockdown has affected every sector from transportation to tourism and poultry businesses.
Considering these all, the World Bank has already lowered the economic growth forecast for the current fiscal year 2019/20 for Nepal to 1.5 per cent minimum to 2.8 per cent maximum from earlier 6.5 per cent growth estimates.
Earlier in October last year, the multilateral donor had estimated that Nepal’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) would expand at the rate of 6.5 per cent.
“Nepal’s growth is expected to fall to a range between 1.5 and 2.8 per cent in FY 2019/20 reflecting lower remittances, trade and tourism, and broader disruptions caused by the COVID-19 outbreak,” said the bank in its latest ‘South Asia Economic Focus’ released recently in Washington DC, USA.
It has revised its forecast by – 4.9 to – 3.2 per cent for this year. According to primary estimates, Nepal’s economy had witnessed 7.1 per cent growth in the last fiscal year.
The government in its budget for the current fiscal year had projected the growth rate at 8.5 per cent, and other multilateral donor Asian Development Bank had put the numbers at 5.3 earlier this month.
According to the WB, a prolonged outbreak of COVID-19 would impact growth significantly with a further deceleration or contraction in services and industrial production.
Likewise, in its latest report, the Nepal Rastra Bank has also shown the effects of coronavirus in national economy.
It said price of goods has gone up in the first eight months of the current fiscal year 2019/20 as compared to previous year.
The year-on-year consumer price inflation stood at 6.7percent in mid-March 2020 compared to 4.2 per cent a year ago. Food and beverage inflation stood at 4.69 per cent in same period of the previous year, Nepal Rastra Bank said in its eight months’ report on macroeconomic situation of the country.
Login to add a comment