September 27: The government has started using Satellite Accounting System with the objective of increasing the contribution of tourism sector in the overall economy of the country.

Nepal Tourism Board has started data entry on the Satellite Accounting System set up with the technical support from the United Nations World Tourism Organisation and financial assistance from UNDP.

The board informed that it had completed the basic survey during the last fiscal year and have started using the system from the current FY.

This system helps to find out the actual contribution of tourism sector to the gross domestic product (GDP) of the country as well as to maintain data related to the tourism sector.

The process to use this system was expedited during the term of former Minister for Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation Late Rabindra Adhikari, who had said in last December that the contribution of tourism sector to the GDP seemed to be apparently less since all the indicators of tourism were not taken into consideration.

However, the minister had claimed before his untimely demise that the contribution of the tourism sector would be much higher with the introduction of the new system.

According to the World Tourism Council, the tourism sector of Nepal has created around 500,000 job opportunities, which is 3.2 percent of the total employment of the country.

Government data show that the tourism sector contributes 2.8 percent of the total GDP. This only includes hotel, travel and trekking sectors. However, World Tourism Council’s data puts the figure at 8 percent.

Minister for Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation Yogesh Bhattarai said that the new system will bring together scattered information related to tourism sector together .

“Tourism sector will become the front runner in providing employment in the country once the date from this sector is released,” claimed Bhattarai.

The ministry has projected the tourism sector to contribute up to 10 percent of the total GDP by the year 2020.