A quarter of Nepali population has bank account: NSO

A quarter of Nepali population has at least one bank account. The additional results of the 2021 Census unveiled recently by the National Statistics Office (NSO) show 7.40m out of 29.16m people in the country have bank accounts at at least one bank or financial institution (except cooperatives). The data reveals that 26.42 percent of men and 24.74 percent of women in Nepal have at least one bank account.

Furthermore, the census data shows that roughly 62 percent of Nepali families have at least one member with a bank account. Out of 6.66m families in the country, 4.12m have at least one member holding a bank account. In terms of education and vocational training, the census indicates that 12.55 percent of Nepali families, or 836,127 families, have members who have pursued technical education and vocational training. However, a mere 5.67 percent of the population above the age of 18,  or 1.08m people, have received such training.

Regarding access to bank loans, only around one-fourth of Nepali families have utilized this financial service. When analyzed by province, the census data shows the highest uptake of bank loans is in the Madhes province where 28.88 percent of the population have acquired bank loans, while the lowest is in Sudurpaschim province (21.96 percent). The census also provides insights into the housing landscape of Nepal. According to the census results, there are a total of 7.55m houses in the country. The majority of these homes, approximately 59.82 percent, are single-storied, while 28.78 percent are two-storied, 9.17 percent are three-storied, 1.3 percent are four-storied, and 0.64 percent have between five and seven stories. A minimal 0.01 percent of houses have eight to nine stories, and only 0.003 percent exceed ten stories in height.

Breaking it down by province, the data shows that a significant 84.42 percent of houses in Madhesh Province are single-storied. In contrast, 2.34 percent of houses in the Bagmati Province have more than five stories. In addition, the census collected data on the age of houses, categorizing them into 12 groups—0 year, one years, two years, three years, four years, 5-9 years, 10-14 years, 15-19 years, 20-19 years, 30-49 years, 50-99 years and more than 100 years. The census results show that nearly 30 percent of houses fall into the 0-4 years age group, while only 0.5 percent of the 7.55m houses are over a century old.

Approximately 10.27 percent of Nepali families, out of the 6.66m in the country, received government grants to assist in building their residential houses. The distribution of these grants is highest in the Bagmati Province at 26.64 percent and lowest in the Sudurpaschim Province at 2.98 percent.