Young entrepreneurs enjoy business as Korala border resumes

By Hari Krishna Sharma, Mustang, Dec. 29: Twenty-eight-year-old Pema Chhiring Gurung of Chhoser, Lomanthang Rural Municipality–2 in Upper Mustang, left carpentry and started a business at the Korala border point. Gurung, who previously travelled across Chhoser and Lomanthang building public and private houses, has got involved in trade for the past two years near No Man’s Land area in Nepal-China border.

Young entrepreneur Gurung earns by guiding visitors and selling goods from her shop at Korala. After the Mustang Customs Office at Nechung began commercial operations on August 16, several locals from Chhoser have left household chores to start businesses.

Around 60 per cent of traders operating at Korala are youths, working alone or with family members and friends with investment of between Rs 300,000 and Rs 1.5 million initially now earn attractive incomes by selling goods to tourists and supplying other markets.

Young people who once sought foreign employment or worked as carpenters, masons and drivers now find jobs locally. “I started my Korala business with money earned from carpentry. The business has now shown me a clear path,” Gurung said. He added that youths are influenced by business after the border reopened, and they have left household chores and farming.

Youths operate businesses at Korala for about nine months a year and travel to Pokhara, Kathmandu and other cities during winter, carrying Chinese and local products for sale, and to avoid the cold, Gurung said.

Locals who leave the district in December-February period to avoid winter also earn through mobile trading.  Ward Chairperson of Lomanthang Rural Municipality–2 and coordinator of its economic committee, said around 80 youths from Mustang now work transporting electric vehicles, goods-carrying trucks and containers between the Chinese market and Korala.

Korala border has changed the local economy by creating and providing job opportunities for over 150 locals in 50 shops. Local people of Mustang have over Rs. 5000 daily earning by transporting goods from China incorporating electric vehicles and more additional items.

The border has mitigated access to employment by giving priority to the local skills, along with traders transporting things across the 186 kilometre from Korala Jomsom -Beni Road to Pokhara. With the increse in both imports and exports from the border point, the customs office here collected Rs 5.06 billion in revenue this year alone.  The border that was closed since the 1960s resumed on 13 November, 2013.