Context and Challenges

Nepal, a landlocked country surrounded by China from the North and by India from East, South and West and constituted by 15% Mountain area, 68% Hilly area and 17% Plain Terai area, is one of the least developed countries of the world where extreme poverty, rapid population growth, lack of proper environmental planning and management, human rights violation and lack of access to water and sanitation exist. The internal conflict which existed for more than a decade pushed it into darkness from developmental point of view. Though the Peoples’ War in 2oo5/2006 brought about a drastic change in political affairs and rights and identity related issues, the nation had to bear heavy loss of infrastructure and human resources during the Maoists insurgency period. In the 21st century of world, other nations are thinking and working hard to grow their economy higher but Nepal and her common citizens are still thinking of meeting the minimum living standards which still seems to take a long time. Some Asian countries having the same per capita income as Nepal some decades ago now have their economy and per capita income that is incomparable with Nepal.
A recent assessment of Millennium Development Goals by National Planning Commission of Nepal and UNDP in 2010 indicates that the following indicators out of a set of 60 indicators are difficult to achieve by 2015:


  • reducing the proportion of the population below a minimum level of dietary energy consumption,
  • the proportion of underweight children aged 6–59 months,
  • proportion of stunted children aged 6–59 months,
  • survival rate to Grade 5,
  • literacy rate for 15–24 year olds,
  • proportion of births attended by skilled birth attendants,
  • universal access to reproductive health and
  • proportion of population using an improved sanitation facility

To achieve the Millennium Development Goals to the greatest extent, there is an urgent need to focus the approach of Public Private Partnership building up the capacity of the local communities, providing them with a livelihood option and mitigating conflict between and among them. The geographical structure of the country and unplanned habitation hinders the developmental activities in Nepal but transforming social lives should be the main area of focus for the reconstruction of Nepal.
