Government implements flexible travel policy to foreign tourists

The government has implemented a flexible policy to facilitate foreign tourist to enter in the country after transition Covid-19. The government has introduced a new loose policy to revive the tourism sector, which has been hit hard by the Covid infection.

The tourism sector has been listed as one of the worst hit areas due to the infection of Covid-19. The government has modified and implemented the criteria, 2077, which has been implemented to manage the tourist traffic. The criteria passed by the cabinet meeting on March 18, has been eased by bringing a tourist-friendly policy.

According to the revised criteria, the five-day hotel quarantine arrangement for foreign tourists has been cancelled. Tourists arriving with a 72-hour PCR negative will have to check the again test for COVID after arriving in Nepal. However, the quarantine requirement has been removed in case of a negative covid report.

Arrangement has been made to stay at the hotel quarantine at one’s own expense till the result of the covid test. It has been mentioned that foreign tourists who have been vaccinated against covid should also get tested for covid. In the case of tourists who have tested positive for covid, they have to stay at the hotel quarantine at their own expense following the prevailing health standards.

New arrangements have been made to issue conditional on arrival visa to tourists. Earlier, on arrival visas were provided only for trekking and mountaineering. Regarding travel insurance, the provision of travel insurance of five thousand US dollars, which was earlier made compulsory for tourists by the Department of Tourism, has been removed. A new arrangement has been brought to validate the travel insurance documents made for emergency, search, rescue, treatment and other travel duration of Nepal.