By Lalit Basel,Surkhet, Dec,1: The Karnali Province Planning Commission has prepared the draft of the province’s second five-year plan.
Covering fiscal years 2024/2025 to 2028/2029, the draft has been finalised and feedback has been collected from various stakeholders. The commission has identified nine programmes as the province’s ‘Game Changer Programmes.’
Hydropower generation, organic and indigenous agricultural production and tourism development (including eco-tourism, religious tourism, agro-tourism and adventure tourism) have been identified as ‘Game Changer Programmes.
Similarly, the commission has recognised industries based on local production, quality physical infrastructure, promotion of entrepreneurship and employment, innovation and digital Karnali, and youth-focused skilled, capable, healthy and robust human resources as transformative initiatives to drive progress.
Presenting the draft during a programme organised to collect feedback, Karnali Province Planning Commission Vice Chairperson Surya Nath Yogi outlined the implementation processes for the ‘Game Changer Programmes.’
He highlighted that these programmes could be executed through provincial government investment, collaboration between provincial and local governments, development partners and foreign assistance, public-private partnerships, private sector investment, and partnerships with cooperatives, non-governmental organisations and communities.
Similarly, to implement these programmes, the commission plans to adopt a structured approach that includes a five-year plan, a project bank, a medium-term expenditure framework, and the annual policy, programme and budget processes.
Similarly, Yogi said that the second five-year plan aims to boost production, employment, and income, reduce poverty, ensure easy and accessible services with extensive participation, promote a creative, dignified, and just society and deliver the outcomes of development to the general public.
Agriculture, land management and cooperatives; minerals, industry, commerce and tourism; labour, employment, and poverty alleviation; and forests, biodiversity, and watersheds have been prioritised for provincial development.
Infrastructure and connectivity; water resources, clean energy and drinking water; health, nutrition and population; education, science, technology, and human capital; as well as good governance and digital Karnali have also been identified as key development priorities, Yogi added.
Yogi further said that infrastructure and connectivity, water resources, clean energy and drinking water, health, nutrition and population, education, science, technology, and human capital, along with good governance and digital Karnali, have also been prioritised in provincial development.
During the first five-year plan, the target for the annual average economic growth rate was set at 14.9 per cent, but only 3.15 per cent was achieved. Similarly, in the industrial sector, the target was 28 per cent, but the achievement stood at just 10.2 per cent, according to the commission.
Out of the target to connect all 79 local levels with road transportation, only 76 were connected. Likewise, the goal to increase electricity production to 20 per cent reached just 16 per cent. Of the target to blacktop 500 kilometres of roads, only 173 kilometres were completed. While the goal was to provide electricity access to 90 per cent of households, only 71 per cent of households benefited.
The first five-year plan fell short of achieving its targets. In response, Yogi said that the draft of the second five-year plan has been prepared by focusing only on feasible and implementable programmes to ensure the targets are met. He added that the draft will be finalised and implemented after incorporating feedback from all stakeholders.
At the programme, Karnali Province Chief Minister Yamlal Kandel expressed the provincial government’s commitment to actively implement the second five-year plan to drive the province towards prosperity.
The Rising Nepal
