It even vowed to implement much ambitious plan of distributing food through ration cards at subsidized price to poor households within a month. [break]
The white paper, which incorporates a total of 76 programs, also envisages to distribute relief cards to low-income households within three months to provide them cooking gas, kerosene and diesel (to farmers) at subsidized rates.
“Ration cards will be introduced targeting poor and downtrodden groups to distribute foods at concessional rates. The process will begin within a month,” said Minister for Commerce and Supplies (MoCS) Lekha Raj Bhatta.
Ministers of previous governments had also tried to introduce the ration card system only to drop the plan due to lack of reliable data to identify the underprivileged families.
Unveiling the white paper, Minister Bhatta claimed that the white paper had tried to identify the problems in trade and supplies sectors and seek measures to take maximum benefits from international trade and ensure smooth supplies in the market.
Amid deepening carteling and syndicate in different sectors, the white paper has announced to register draft bills to amend different acts including Organization Registration Act at the parliament within six months, endorse guidelines to conduct commodity and service market monitoring within one month, implement the Business Plan that envisages strengthening the business capacity of ailing state-owned National Trading Ltd within three months and reintroducing minimum support price for major agro produces within one year.
The white paper has also outlined the programs including executing the new supplies policy and mandatory provision of announcing stock of foods and maxim limit for stocking foods by traders within three months, enforcing a law to allow private sector to import petroleum products within six months, reviewing petroleum purchase agreement between state-owned Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC) and India Oil Corporation (IOC) within five months, establishing Price Stabilization Fund to tame the price in domestic market when prices in international markets rise.
Similarly, the white paper has also identified 32 programs to promote exports by strengthening supplies capacity of Nepal.
It has also announced host of programs including enactment of new import-export policy, adopting single window policy for trade facilitation, signing preferential trade agreement with Bhutan, and developing international standard Trade Exhibition Ground, among others.
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