Nepal government, donors agree to scale up GRID

Nepal government and 16 development partners agreed to consolidate and scale up financing and technical assistance to support Nepal to implement a set of high-priority investments and policies in line with Nepal’s Green, Resilient, and Inclusive Development (GRID).

A joint communique to operationalize Nepal’s GRID Strategic Action Plan was endorsed at a high-level event organized today by the Ministry of Finance with support from the World Bank and other development partners.

 At the event, the government, development partners, civil society organizations, private sector stakeholders, and think tanks also renewed their commitments to work across institutional and sectoral boundaries to continue to finance and implement Nepal’s GRID priorities. 

“In Nepal, we have already internalized the GRID approach to build a greener, more resilient, and more inclusive economy that can withstand shocks, protect our environment, and uplift the lives of our people,” said Finance Minister, Dr. Prakash Sharan Mahat. “Nepal’s new GRID Strategic Action Plan can be a policy vehicle that accelerates growth and job creation, strengthens livelihoods, and boosts the prosperity of Nepali people sustainably.”

The external financing for the GRID Strategic Action Plan includes grants and other concessional financing such as subsidized loans, and innovative financing such as carbon finance. External financing is complemented by Nepal’s public budget and also aims to leverage foreign and domestic private sector investment.

The GRID Strategic Action Plan identifies a set of ten priority actions including: managing land, water, and forests in a more productive, sustainable, and integrated way for more resilient infrastructure, ecosystems, and food systems; equipping people with new skills and resilient livelihoods.

Other areas include :  greening urban development; scaling up water supply and sanitation, reducing air pollution and managing solid waste; scaling up renewable energy; boosting the sustainability and resilience of transport; strengthening disaster risk management; and enhancing social protection and health systems to be more responsive to shocks.

“The World Bank is proud to support Nepal to take this strategic step toward a more sustainable, resilient, and inclusive economy,” said Anna Bjerde, World Bank Managing Director for Operations. “Nepal’s GRID approach focuses on the quality of development and growth—the type of growth that reduces extreme poverty, narrows structural inequalities, protects the environment, sustains the growth process, and makes it more resilient.”

Investment priorities in the GRID Strategic Action Plan aim to build on Nepal’s development success stories, scale up action on the ground, help mobilize private sector investment, and deliver sustainability along with resilience and inclusion at the same time.  This will help create more jobs for more people; build the resilience of people and their livelihoods; boost environmental, climate, water, and food security; and create opportunities for a more inclusive and durable economy, World bank said.