Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli has urged the private sector to increase investment in the readymade garment.

During an interaction at his residence at Baluwatar on Monday, the Prime Minister asked business leaders to take maximum benefit of the duty-free market access facility the US has given to Nepali readymade garment products.

The US House of Represent-atives in the second week of December passed a bill, allowing Nepali readymade garment duty-free access to the US market until 2025, for which domestic manufacturers had been lobbying for more than a decade.

“PM Oli welcomed the decision of the US government of providing duty-free access to Nepali garments in its market,” the Office of the Prime Minister said in a statement.

Oli had invited representatives from the Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FNCCI), Confederation of Nepalese Industries (CNI) and Nepal Chamber of Commerce (NCC) to discuss the issue.

Around 50 private sector participants, including FNCCI President Pashupati Murarka, CNI President Narendra Basnyat, NCC President Rajesh Kaji Shrestha, attended the interaction. “The PM suggested the entrepreneurs focus on quality and price for making Nepali products competitive,” the statement reads.

In response, the businessmen demanded the government create a conducive environment for increasing investment and production in the readymade garment sector.

Murarka said the entrepreneurs told the PM the ongoing strikes, blockade and load-shedding could undermine the benefits of the US facility. “We need to make sure we deliver the orders in time. For this, we need uninterrupted production,” said Murarka, adding a failure to deliver the products in time would raise questions about the credibility of Nepali entrepreneurs.

According to Murarka, readymade garments entering the US market are levied 17.5 percent customs tax. Once the new provision is implemented, the tax will be waived, making the Nepali products competitive.

“The economy has collapsed due to protracted closure of industries. The government is mulling a special plan for reopening the industries,” Oli said. “The private sector should support the government initiative.”

During heydays of the Nepali garment industry, the US used to be one of the major markets of Nepali garments, buying more than 80 percent Nepal’s total exports.

Nepal had started lobbying for such a facility since 2001 and the first bill on allowing Nepali garment duty-free access was registered at the US Parliament in 2002. But the efforts received a major boost this January when US Senator Dianne Feinstein introduced a bill—Nepal Trade Preferences Act—to allow duty-free import of textiles and apparel products from Nepal.