KATHMANDU: Nepal Tourism Board has started preparations to set up a province level office. The board has assigned field staff to make the necessary preparations for the office setup.
According to the board, the board will now open its offices in all the seven provinces. The officials deployed in the provinces would submit a report to the center with necessary preparations within 10 days and the board would set up an office on the basis of the same report. Aiming at expanding and decentralizing the activities of NTB, the board has taken forth this work.
The Board has allocated Rs. 10 million in the budget of the current fiscal year for the purpose of establishing the provincial offices. However, as tourist arrivals are still uncertain, the revenue is not as high as projected by the board this year. In case this amount is not enough, a board is preparing to ask for a budget from the government.
Meanwhile, the provincial governments are preparing to set up their own tourism boards at their level instead of expanding the federal NTB offices. From the budget and policies and programs of the Fiscal Year 2019/2020, the provincial governments had set a target to open their own tourism board. Some have even implemented it. The provinces aim to form boards in the public-private-partnership concept.