April 12: As the small businessmen living in the capital valley have fled, about 35 percent of the shutters used by them have now become empty. When businesses crumbled due to the recession, the small businessmen fled as they were unable to pay the rents and high interest rates of banks. On top o f it, the landlords increased the rents. Due to this, the shutters made for commercial purposes are being emptied rapidly.

Businessmen estimate that the process of evacuating shutters and fleeing will continue to increase. Naresh Katuwal, president of the National Federation of Independent Businesses (NFIB) says that small traders are the most affected by economic slowdown.

The decline in purchasing capacity of the consumers has resulted a slump in business slump which has also been affected by the increment in rents by landlords and interest rates by the banks. 

According to Katuwal, overall business has shrunk to 30 to 40 percent compared to the normal situation. He told that most of the landlords in the valley increase the rent by 10 percent every year. Katuwal said, “Business is declining due to lack of liquidity, high rent, high interest rate of banks and increasing competition. As a result, the businessmen are forced to flee the business by emptying the shutters.”

Speaking with New Business Age, he added, “We estimate that about 35 percent of the shutters are empty now.”

As a result of the recession in business, shutters have been in areas including New Road, Asan, Indrachok, Khichhapokhari, Thamel, Sundhara, Balaju, Kalanki, Chabahil, Koteshwar and Baneshwor.

Businessmen are paying rent ranging from Rs 50,000 to 500,000 per month for a single shutter in those areas.

The business sector, which has slowed down after the Covid-19 pandemic, has reached a situation where traders are unable to cope with the crisis due to the disruptions from all sides. Ranjit Tandukar, who is dealing in ready-made clothes, says that their business has slumped due to the decrease in consumer's income. He says that most of the people who come to the shop ask for the price of the goods and return.

More than 15,000 businessmen of the valley are affiliated to NFIB. During the Covid-19 pandemic, when the shutters had to be closed, some landlords had waived their house rent at the initiative of the federation. At that time, Civil Mall, People's Plaza, Ranjana Trade Mall and others in New Road and the surrounding areas gave a rent discount of 1 to 7 months.

Economist Gyanendra Adhikari says that the biggest weakness of the government is that the small businessmen are unable to cope with the current crisis.

According to him, the government should implement separate policies for small and big businesses in the monetary policy and budget. He argues that when the government made policies and rules for businessmen who can employ thousands of human resources and also to those who employ five people, small businessmen suffered the most during the crisis. Officials say that the current situation has come because there is no investment environment due to political instability and the global economic crisis.

To prevent the businessmen from giving up on their businesses, the businessmen demand that the house rent should be fixed on the basis of square feet by implementing the scientific home rent rate and the interest rate of the bank which is in double digits should be reduced to a single digit.