The ministry´s proposal will be tabled during the next meeting of the privatization committee which will be held soon.[break]
"The meeting will decide whether to liquidate the center as per the suggestions of the MoAC,” a reliable source at the Ministry of Finance told Republica.
Established more than two decades ago, the center´s main responsibility is to conduct research and provide consultation services on agriculture-related projects. But ever since the formation of the NARC in 1991, it has remained defunct as the autonomous organization was asked to lead the way in conducting works that fell in the domain of the center.
"Yet three people are still under its payroll which is adding financial burden on the government," the source said. "This is the reason why the ministry wants to liquidate it. Besides, there is no logic behind running two organizations of similar nature."
The center is 62.5 percent owned by Nepal Rastra Bank, the central bank. Other stakeholders in the centre include the government, which has 25.63 percent shares, Nepal Bank Limited, which has 6.25 percent stake, Agriculture Development Bank Limited, which owns 3.12 percent of the company, and Rastriya Banijya Bank, which has 2.5 percent stake in it.
The government is recently trying to trim its expenses on public enterprises as most of them are incurring losses despite injection of billions of rupees on them.
The government has so far pumped in Rs 233 billion in 36 public enterprises, but they only gave Rs 4.8 billion in return in the financial year 2009/10, according to latest audited figures. Besides, expenses on staff members have been going up every year with the figure touching 51.45 percent of the total administrative cost in 2009/10.
Many blame inefficiency, unproductive workforce, absence of competitive chief executives, unnecessary political interference and technological backwardness as reasons for their unsatisfactory performance.
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