Nepal

The Kingdom of Nepal borders with Tibet Autonomous Region of China in the north and with India in all other three sides. The country has an extreme topography and climate. The altitude ranges from 70 meters to 8848 meters and climate varies from Tropical to Polar in a very short distance of about 120 miles-average distance between Southern and Northern boarders. The country stretches east-west with average length of 553 miles. Nepal is a land-locked country located more than 1000 km from Calcutta, India, its most important port.

Nepal's population in terms of race and language can be divided into two main groups: the Aryans, an Indo-European speaking group, and the Mongolian Tibetan-Burmese speaking ethnic groups. Nepali, a language originating from Sanskrit, is the mother tongue of about 50% of the population. The remainder speaks other languages such as Maithili, Bhojpuri, Tharu, Tamang, etc. The majority of the population is Hindu (80.62%), the state religion until 2008. The other denominations include Buddhists (10.74%), Muslims (4.2%) and Christians (0.45%). Nepal's population is estimated at approximately 26.4 million (2007) with an annual growth rate of about 2.25% (based on 2001 census). About 40% of the population is under the age of 15 years. Even with a declining population growth rate, it is estimated that Nepal's population will reach 30 million by the year 2010.

Nepal is one of the groups of countries classified by the UN as least developed. With a GDP per inhabitant of US $383 (estimated for the year 2006/07), Nepal is one of the world's poorest countries. No clear documentation on absolute poverty in Nepal is available and figures vary, depending on calculation methodology, from 40-71% of the population.

Social development remains at a very low level. Infant mortality is 48 per 1000 live births (2007) and average life expectancy is 63.3 years of age for men and 64.1 years of age for women. Only 54.1% of the population can read and write--65.5% of men and 42.8% of women (2001 census).

In the health sector there were only 89 hospitals with 6796 beds in the fiscal year 2005-06. In the same year there were 1,259 doctors working in the government hospitals together with 11,637 nurses and 7,491 health assistants.