Kathmandu, April 2 : The industries producing daily essentials and important development projects are being allowed to resume operation, provided they meet the required health standards. A decision to this end was taken by the COVID-19 prevention and control high-level coordination committee. The committee meeting today took the decision to ease the supply of daily essential and speed up important projects.
Other industries will also be allowed to function if they can manage in-house staffers are fullfiling all health requirements, said government spokesperson and Minister for Communications and Information Technology Dr Yubaraj Khatiwada. Accordingly, Tamakoshi hydropower project, Melamchi drinking water project will be allowed to function with staff already stationed in the project site.
Also harvesting of the winter crop including wheat and planting of paddy seeds will also be allowed without bringing workers from outside and using local and family workers. The committee also discussed on facilitating the mobilization of the COVID-19 Crisis Management Centre. Furthermore, transportation of good carrier vehicles will be eased to facilitate the supply and transportation of daily essentials, medicines and fuel. The meeting also decided to keep the records of daily essential goods imported regularly and produced within the country.
The committee decided to keep measures focusing Nepali nationals being quarantined on border entry points and to provide necessary security arrangement for foreign workers residing in Nepal. The committee took the decision to extend thanks to the countries for keeping Nepali nationals in a safe manner. The committee has requested those quarantined for 14 days to cooperate each other in the crisis time.
Meanwhile, the government spokesperson, Dr Khatiwada, responding to queries of journalists said matters related to the procurement of medical appliances and kits can be stated only after necessary investigation, not being swayed away by whims. “Important aspect is – the medical stuff imported is being supportive to safeguard people’s lives. There are oversight agencies to see and oversee whether it was expensive or not and due diligence maintained or not”, he asserted. Informing that it would be good to import medical materials through government channels, he however admitted government’s failure in the experiment it had applied before.
He also shared the experience that it was compulsion to call on private sector when there were hurdles in procuring materials through government channels as both the neighboring governments were in trouble. Minister Dr Khatiwada shared that today’s meeting also discussed to explore any possible ways to go through the government channel to purchase the necessary stuffs.RSS
