Nepal parties accord high priority to develop power generation

Nepal's major political parties today vowed to accord high priority to developing energy generation to meet the country's domestic need and allow export of power.
Addressing an interaction programme organised by Independent Power Producers' Association Nepal (IPPAN) here today, former Water Resources Minister and Nepali Congress central member Laxman Ghimire underlined the need to forge national consensus for developing hydropower of the country.
Elaborating on the election manifesto of the Nepali Congress, he said the party aims to end the current power outage in the country within the next three years and utilise the immense potentiality of water resources in the country to generate power for export purpose.

Former Water Resources Minister and CPN-UML leader Pradip Nepal said that his party emphasises on developing small hydropower projects for domestic consumption while developing large products for export purposes.
Nepal can attain economic prosperity if the country's abundant water resources can be utilised through building political consensus, he said.
Leader of Terai Madhes Democratic Party Ratneshwor Kayastha underlined the need to develop storage-based hydropower projects to meet the power requirement of the country.

The government should clearly safeguard downstream benefits of the river for the country while generating hydroelectricity projects, he said.
Secretary, Ministry of Energy, Bishwa Prakash said that the energy sector of the country should be liberalised to attract more foreign investments in the sector.

As Nepal's power generation cost is higher than that of India and China, the focus should be on developing low hydropower projects, Prakash said.
Nepal's major political parties have made energy as one of the important agenda during the election campaign.
The country is witnessing second Constituent Assembly election on November 19 to draft a new Constitution.