Tourism minister urges all to make VNY 2020 a success
By Ramesh Tiwari —-
Kathmandu: Minister for Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation Yogesh Kumar Bhattarai has urged all stakeholders to contribute to make the Visit Nepal Year 2020 successful.
Visit Nepal Year 2020 aims at bringing in 2 million tourists. Upgrading of Tribhuvan International Airport, operation of the under-construction Gautam Buddha International Airport, upgrading other domestic airports and more promotional campaigns are kept in priority for making the VNY 2020 a success.
“A grand opening of Visit Nepal Year 2020 will be held on January 1, 2020 in all the seven states of the country. The Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation will work with 35 parliamentary friendship groups, diplomatic missions, non-governmental organizations and international organizations to make the VNY 2020 successful, “he said at a press meet held on Saturday.
The minister reiterated his commitment to improve Nepal Airlines Corporation (NAC) , make the Tribhuwan International Airport a boutique airport , improve immigration and visa system as soon as possible.
He informed that discussions are going on with the concerned countries to operate direct air services to Guangzhou , Seoul and Sydney as earliest as possible.
He urged the VNY secretariat to be more active to promote the country. Bhattarai informed that promotional campaigns will be launched in ten major destinations including India and China.
He informed that the suggestions and recommendations of the panel on Everest expedition will be implemented.
He has already made public one-year action plan of the Ministry including policy-level reforms, strengthening of aviation sector and making Visit Nepal Year 2020 a success.
The action plan has incorporated upgrading of Tribhuvan International Airport and service management as per international airport standard.
He said that pre-conditions would be fulfilled to remove Nepal’s aviation sector from the black list of the European Union and a new law would be formulated by building separate structure of CAAN.
As Gautam Buddha International Airport will operate by March 2020, the government is eager to welcome more tourists from the Buddhist countries in Lumbini. Munich Airport has shown interest for operation and management of GBIA, he said.
“Construction of GBIA is all set to be completed by December. After that, we will be working on other airports aiming to bring it into operation ,” he said.
The minister reiterated government’s commitment to construct Nijgadh International Airport (NIA) and complete the construction of Pokhara International airport by December 2020.
September 22 , 2019
