An earthquake struck in Nepal in 2015 that ended up killing 9,000 people around Kathmandu. The earthquake took a lot of lives and destroyed homes and cities, because of this people are now facing debts that they need to pay. Ratna Awale is a survivor of the earthquake along with her husband and two sons, but unfortunately her home was severely damaged and now according to her, “We are caught between paying the loan and feeding ourselves”.
In wake of the earthquake the government tried to help homeowners by giving hundreds of thousands of homeowners 3,000$, which ended up costing the government in total $10 billion which cut their economic output in half. That didn’t cover it all though for most families, Awale had to take a loan out and is paying 14% interest on her loan. Interest rates on loans have been seen as high as 43%. There are about 820,000 homes with severe damage from the earthquake that qualify for the $3,000 grant from the government.
If I was Nepal, I would be focusing on fixing their political structure and rebuilding the most important parts of the country first with its most wealthy citizens. I would do this because they’re economic output has just been cut in half, so they need to reassure their important and wealthy citizens that they are taking steps in the right direction in improving their economy. Improving themselves politically is important because they just got out of a civil war, and after this earthquake they seem even more vulnerable. While rebuilding from this devastating earthquake Nepal needs to focus on rebuilding their political structure and rebuilding their economy, they should also work on future plans to in case an event like this happens again, or ways to progress their country in the future.