Fighting back the major challenges posed by natural disasters in the recent past, Nepal’s tourism is on the path of recovery and hoping big this time.

Even though Nepal has been the right destination for tourists across the world, the country’s tourism sector has been facing some key issues.

Over the years, the country has allocated various resources for external tourism and as a result, large scale of outbound tourism was observed from the country. However, the domestic tourism on the other side, could not get its required attention.

Addressing such concerns, this time, NTB has decided to boost domestic tourism on par with the external tourism by promoting various local tourist destinations.

Proper tapping of the opportunities created by the increasing disposable income and spending power of Nepalis can give enough boost to the growth of the domestic tourism, opines NTB.

For this, the country’s tourism sector also expects the stakeholders to do their part in addressing key challenges such as infrastructure and investment, promotion and disaster management, and proper marketing, among others for the expansion of domestic tourism.

Towards this end, the Government of Nepal also declared Nepali year 2073 as the Nepal Travel Year and NTB has also allocated Rs 2 million for implementation of promotional activities.

NTB Hopeful of This Season

NTB has planned big for the Nepal Tourism Season 2017.

“Last year, there was an exponential growth in the domestic tourism sector as around 4.5 million internal tourists visited different parts of the country. We are hopeful that this year, more number of domestic tourists will visit different parts of Nepal,” says Deepak Raj Joshi, Chief Executive Officer (CEO), NTB.

According to Deepak Joshi, the board is carrying out various promotional activities in this regard to boost the domestic tourism activity during this season.

“For the development of domestic tourism, NTB is currently continuing the last year’s Travel Nepal programs and we have also added other programs such as Photo Nepal for advocating Nepali tourism through photography, Safa Nepal to promote cleanliness around heritage sites and Chulo Nepal to promote Nepali food along with food hygiene,” he informed.

Besides, NTB is also organizing programs to support home-stay services through capacity building, market linkage and other training schemes.

“NTB is only promoting Nepal in international platform. It must introduce programs to promote domestic tourism within Nepal. Furthermore, it should also engage in dialogue with the private sector and allocate budget for programs after discussions and consultation,” says Dilip Mainali, President of Chitwan Tourism Development Committee.

Seasonal Trends and Related Concerns

The domestic tourism in Nepal is majorly dependent on seasonal trends. On the flip side, these trends are also posing serious challenges to the industry players in the Nepali tourism sector.

With the tourists flocking to major domestic tourism spots only during the peak season, the tourism entrepreneurs of the country are finding it difficult to safeguard their business interests and investment through dependence on tourism.

“Due to Dashain-Tihar vacation, there is an enormous inflow of Nepali tourists. As a matter of fact, Manang is currently crowded and we are facing problems in accommodating the arrivals. On an average, we are receiving 400-500 domestic tourists per day,” says Binod Gurung, Proprietor of Hotel Yeti and President of Tourism Traders Association (TTA), Manang.

Pokhara, Manang, Mustang, Lumbini, Chitwan, , Tilicho Lake, , Rara Lake and Ghandruk are among the major tourist destinations during the peak season.

It’s Time to Identify New Destinations

Lack of a strong chain network of tourist destinations is being considered as one of the major reasons hindering the growth of domestic tourism in Nepal.

While most of the key domestic tourist spots in Nepal fall under rural parts of the country, tourism industry stakeholders pitch on the need for development of more new destinations.

Stressing on the need for promotion of domestic tourism, Bijaya Amatya, President of Kora Tours, says,” The involvement of youths in adventure tourism is very positive for the industry. However, we need to work on new destinations for adventure tourism. It is not feasible to rely on the old form of adventure sport.”

Amatya calls for a significant involvement of local communities in the initial phases of promoting rural areas as tourism spots under domestic tourism.

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Tourist inflow to Chitwan takes a hit as the landslide that took place last week disrupted the Narayanghat-Mugling highway.

With this, tourists who had planned to tour Chitwan started cancelling their trips for other tourist hubs like Pokhara and Bandipur, thus making Chitwan’s popular tourist destinations, such as Shaura, Meghauli, Patihani and Kashara almost vacant.

This is hitting the business of tourism enterprises in Chitwan who claimed of witnessing a sharp decline in their business. Hotel entrepreneurs of the district are worried at the alarming rate of booking cancellations.

Business Affected Due to Roads Condition

“Our business is seriously affected by the road condition. We asked the tourists to return from Mugling as the road to Chitwan was not safe,” says Shyam Kaji Mahat, operator of Hotel Central Park situated at Shaura.

According to Mahat, around 60 Indian tourists left for Pokhara as an alternative. While his hotel has a capacity of 46 rooms, all of them are vacant at the moment.

“Although, this is not a major season for tourist inflow, we used to have 25 to 50 percent occupancy in previous years,” said Suman Ghimire, President of Hotel Association Nepal (HAN) Chitwan Chapter.

More than 100 hotel owners of Shaura are facing a similar issue and the industry that was employing around 2,000 members is on the verge of collapse.

Meanwhile, travel traders are concerned about the ‘golden triangle tour’ that covers Chitwan, Pokhara and Lumbini, a widely popular circuit among sightseers in Nepal. They are worried that one of the components could be removed from the tour packages because of the disastrous condition of the highway linking the destination.

Potential tourists being reluctant to Chitwan packages at international travel mart is also raising concern over the competitive status of safari destination in Chitwan.

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