Golf and global brands signal rising prospects for the Himalayan kingdom

The hills are alive with the sound of golf balls. The hills in question are the highest in the world: the Himalayas. And golf is the new buzzword in Nepal. A global sport, golf attracts high-net-worth tourists, especially from South Korea and China, which have recently begun direct flights to Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan Airport. That’s good news for the Nepalese economy. Golf tourists, bags crammed with gleaming titanium Big Bertha drivers, spend more per head per day than the penny-pinching backpackers who previously made up Nepal’s tourist population. Caddies get decent cash tips and entrepreneurship flourishes among the children who perch on the perimeter wall, waiting to sell you back your golf ball after you’ve shanked it into the trees. Back at the resort and spa, your package will include airport pick-up, three nights’ accommodation, all meals and drinks, unlimited golf and a half-day city tour — all for the price of a modest meal in London. Spend a few days taking in the pine-scented air of the neighbouring Gorkarna Forest and you can convince yourself that Nepal has emerged from years of civil unrest and is on the up. Only the monkeys prowling the hotel grounds and leering at your glass of mango lassi hint at a deeper unease.

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Sadly, Nepal is not part of boom-time Asia. India’s average annual growth rate of 8.6 per cent for the past three years is something of which 28 million Nepalis can currently only dream; latest figures put Nepal’s growth rate at around 2 per cent. A decade of civil unrest and political chaos has had a direct impact on the kingdom’s economy, crippling tourism, manufacturing and investment. Bandhs (strikes), curfews, kidnappings and roadblocks have closed a third of the country’s manufacturing base — including the carpet-weaving sweatshops, often reliant on child labour, that produce one of Nepal’s major exports.