May 19: The share of the private sector in Nepal's GDP is 81.55 percent. This was stated in a study report prepared by the Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FNCCI) with support from International Financial Corporation (IFC).    
The report was prepared with the cooperation of the National Statistics Office.    
Minister for Industry, Commerce and Supplies Ramesh Rijal launched the report amid a programme on Thursday evening. On the occasion, he said the report reflects the status of the private sector in the country's economy and thanked FNCCI and IFC for preparing it.    
The private sector's contribution to the GDP in FY 2012/13 was 86.67 percent. The report shows that the private sector's contribution has decreased due to the contraction in the economy as a result of the fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic, earthquake among other reasons.    
The report shows that the government's investment has gone up while the contribution of the private sector has diminished during the post-earthquake and pandemic period.    
According to the report, the private sector companies have expanded by 32 times in the national economy in the last 30 years. There were a total 28,660 industries in 1983 and the number of enterprises has increased by 30 times and reached 923,356 by 2018.    
The private sector is also at the forefront in terms of employment creation. It covers 85.6 percent to total employment. It has provided 57 percent employment in agriculture, forest and fishery sector, and 12.5 percent in the wholesale and retail trade and vehicle repair sector, FNCCI president Chandra Prasad Dhakal said.    
He added that the private sector has provided around 5.5 million jobs whereas the government only 427,000 jobs.    
The FNCCI president underscored the need for structural reforms for the private sector to work in full capacity. He also stressed on the need of the government to increase the capital expenditure and suggested to the government to prioritize expansion of investment areas, sustainable development, private-public partnership, among other topics in the budget for the upcoming fiscal year 2023/24. -- RSS