Around 500,000<\/a> Nepalis enter the job market each year, but the country generates jobs for approximately 80,000 only. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In the seven months leading up to February 2024, more than 2,000<\/a> Nepalis entered the international labour market in search of employment opportunities every day. In the fiscal year 2022-2023, a record high of more than 771,000<\/a> work permits were issued by Nepal\u2019s foreign employment department. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In 2019, the International Organization for Migration (the UN\u2019s migration agency) referenced Nepal\u2019s population and housing census of 2011 to note that almost 50%<\/a> of households had a member who had either worked overseas, or was still there. A 2023 World Bank estimate suggested 27%<\/a> of Nepal\u2019s GDP comes from payments sent home by migrant workers.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n Though economic migration is a decades-old phenomenon in Nepal, researchers say that in recent years, extreme weather events and climate change-induced disasters are adding to the factors pushing people out of the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe reasons<\/a> [for Nepalis] to go to foreign countries are socio-economic conditions and a lack of employment opportunities here in Nepal,\u201d says Amina Maharjan, a migration specialist at the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development. \u201cLately, however, we are seeing people choose labour or educational migration as an adaptive measure to post-disaster economic burdens.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Maharjan\u2019s conclusions are mirrored by a 2023 report<\/a> by Equidem, a human rights and labour rights non-profit: \u201cWorkers interviewed by Equidem migrated for employment to the UAE from the Philippines, Mozambique, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Nepal \u2013 five of the ten countries most affected by climate change between 2000 and 2019.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sunder Pandit, 26, now lives in Sydney, Australia. But he often wonders where he would be today if the massive flash flood on Nepal\u2019s Melamchi River had not occurred in June 2021. The disaster claimed at least 17 lives<\/a> and swept away infrastructure and hundreds of houses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThat flood pushed me to choose migration in the name of education, but it is not what I wanted or dreamed of,\u201d says Pandit, talking to The Third Pole over the phone. \u201cThe flood swept away our newly established hospitality business and trout farm, where we had invested around NPR8 million [USD 60,300] by taking loans.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Melamchi flood originated in eastern Nepal\u2019s rural Helambu region, where scores of homes were destroyed<\/a>. One of them belonged to Pandit and his family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pandit was fresh out of college, where he studied hospitality management. He had finished an internship in China and was working in a Nepali tourism hotspot, the city of Pokhara, to gain experience. He then returned home to the Sindhupalchok municipality where he launched the Helambu Riverside Resort<\/a> with his brother, in their village of Chanaute.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cEverything was going great; we were using local products, and the fish farm was also there,\u201d Pandit says. \u201cWithin a year, our business took off and already provided employment to 12 locals. But at a time when we were planning to go big, the flood hit hard, and I ended up here.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 2021, the environment department published its latest vulnerability and risk assessment<\/a>. It categorises Sindhupalchok as a \u201chigh-impact\u201d area when it comes to climate-induced disasters, while reports<\/a> suggest the 2021 Melamchi flood was climate-induced. \u201cThe Melamchi flood pushed us out from our village,\u201d Pandit says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Thirty five migrant workers were interviewed by The Third Pole for this report. One of them is 50-year-old Ram Bindo Yadav, who was waiting for a bus from Kathmandu’s main airport to his village in Siraha district on a late January afternoon. He used to farm on rented land, \u201cbut in recent years, farming became difficult; there is no irrigation, and we don\u2019t get rainfall when it is needed.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ram Bindo was returning from Qatar and one of many migrant workers catching a bus home. Bhuran Yadav, 43, came forward to share his story: \u201cMy family\u2019s livelihood depends on agriculture. Uncertain rainfall and frequent droughts in the monsoon season and winter are some of the main reasons I went to Qatar.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe climate factor<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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