China among top five bilateral donors to Nepal

KATHMANDU, Jan 17, 2019, Xinhua. China is among top five bilateral donors in disbursing highest amount of foreign aid to Nepal in the last fiscal year 2017-18 that concluded in mid-July 2018, Nepal’s Finance Ministry said on Wednesday, reported the Xinhua.

While Britain, the U.S. and Japan have been traditionally big aid providers to Nepal, China and India are late entrants in the league of top foreign aid providers, according to the ministry.

China’s contribution to overall foreign aid to Nepal in the last fiscal year stood at 3.6 percent, according to a report from the ministry.

Nepal received a total of 1.62 billion U.S. dollars from bilateral and multilateral donors in the last fiscal year.

Shreekrishna Nepal, chief of the international economic cooperation coordination division at the Finance Ministry, told Xinhua on Wednesday that the Chinese aid has been utilized in a number of important infrastructure projects.

“Expansion of the Ring Road in Kathmandu which surrounds the key city area of the city, an international airport in Pokhara, a tourism city in western Nepal, expansion of Civil Hospital in Kathmandu, among others, are notable projects undertaken with Chinese assistance,” he said.

Likewise, Chinese assistance has also been used in construction of a hydropower project and a transmission line, post-earthquake reconstruction, budgetary support to the Nepali government, among others, according to the report.