September 27: Preparations for the NewBiz Business Conclave and Awards have been completed for the annual event scheduled to be held on Friday, September 27, at Soaltee Crowne Plaza, Kathmandu. The organizer informed that all the foreign delegates have arrived in Kathmandu and the award recipients already selected by the jury. 

Finance Minister Dr Yuba Raj Khatiwada will be inaugurating the event which will be attended by some 500 high level professionals from public and private sector including politicians, government officials, business leaders from banking, travel and tourism and other sectors as well as academicians.

As Nepal is observing Visit Nepal Year 2020, this year’s Conclave is focused on the theme “Tourism to Prosperity: Sharing Best Practices” so as to help in this national campaign. This year’s event is supported by Visit Nepal 2020 and is being held in association with Hotel Association of Nepal. Similarly, Nepal Tourism Board is partnering as the promoter. 

In the conclave, representatives from Mekong Tourism Coordinating Office, Bhutan and Laos will share their respective country or region’s experiences in promoting and developing tourism. Jens Thraenhart, CEO of Mekong Tourism, Sonam Jatso, tourism entrepreneur of Bhutan and Bounlap Douangphoumy, deputy director general of the Tourism Marketing Department of the Ministry of Information, Culture and Tourism of Laos are scheduled to make their presentations.  Shreejana Rana, president of Hotel Association Nepal, will make a presentation on behalf of Nepal.

The presentations will be followed by a panel discussion on Nepal’s tourism issues. The panelists include Ghanashyam Upadhyaya, joint secretary at the Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation; Suraj Vaidya, coordinator of the Visit Nepal 2020 campaign; Deepak Raj Joshi, CEO of Nepal Tourism Board; Khem Lakai, CEO of Global Academy of Tourism and Hospitality Education; Prachanda Man Shrestha, former CEO of Nepal Tourism Board; and Upaul Majumdar, general manager of Soaltee Crowne Plaza. The panel will be moderated by Pankaj Pradhananga, director of Four Season Travel and Tours.

Awards for Business Excellence

The conclave will be followed by awards ceremony in which 21 companies and one individual will be presented with special honours. The awards will be presented to one best managed company, 12 best managed banking and financial companies, six best managed insurance companies and two best start-up companies.

Similarly, the Lifetime Achievement in Business Leadership award will be presented to one dedicated business person in recognition of his/her innovative and visionary leadership over a long period of time in the field of business.

According to the organizing committee, separate special juries comprising of independent, experienced and socially respected professionals were set up to make the selection of companies and individuals for the awards. All the juries have completed their selection based on separate criteria fixed by themselves for the respective categories.

This annual event is organized by New Business Age since 2013. Asian Paints is the title sponsor for this event as in the previous years.  The event was not held in 2015 due to the uncomfortable situation that the country was passing through that year following the Gorkha earthquake.

The other supporters of this year’s event include Sipradi Trading, Norvic International Hospital, Nimbus, Turkish Airlines, National Insurance, Nepal Life Insurance, IME, Soaltee Crowne Plaza, President Travels, Ballentine’s, Saujanya Media and Durga Engineering.