Nepal Now: On the Move
We're talking with the people migrating from, to, and within this Himalayan country located between China and India. You'll hear from a wide range of Nepali men and women who have chosen to leave the country for better work or education opportunities. Their stories will help you understand what drives people — in Nepal and worldwide — to mortgage their property or borrow huge sums of money to go abroad, often leaving their loved ones behind.
Despite many predictions, migration from Nepal has not slowed in recent years, except briefly during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. About 1 million Nepalis leave every year to work at jobs outside the country. Tens of thousands go abroad to study. Far fewer return to Nepal to settle. The money ('remittances') that workers send home to their families accounts for 25% of the country's GDP, but migration impacts Nepal in many other ways. We'll be learning from migrants, experts and others about the many cultural, social, economic and political impacts of migration.
Your host is Marty Logan, a Canadian journalist who has lived in Nepal's capital Kathmandu off and on since 2005. Marty started the show in 2020 as Nepal Now.
Nepal Now: On the Move
No magic pill—maternal healthcare in Nepal
As you've likely heard, Nepal is in the throes of a second wave of Covid-19. This has raised fears that, just like during and after the lockdown of 2020, women will be using reproductive, maternal and child health services much less than usual, or as necessary. One result is likely to be more births taking place in risky home settings.
Today, we’re going on the road to visit two such homes. We set out to track what seemed to be a magic pill used to protect pregnant women, but the trip morphed into a quest to understand why more than 1,000 Nepali women a year continue dying during what should be one of the best experiences of their lives — childbirth.
Please let us know if you’d like to hear more episodes in this format. We are on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook, as Nepal Now or Nepal Now Pod. You can also leave a voice message on our webpage — anchor.fm/nepalnow. If you’re really moved, you can leave a review of the show on Apple podcasts.
We’re posting photos from Chimling Village on our social media accounts. Please check them out.
We’d like to thank One Heart Worldwide for their cooperation, especially Surya Bhatta, for frankly sharing his passionate opinions on maternal health, and Babita Bindu, for leading the trip to Chimling Village and providing interpretation. We'd also like to thank Kutumba, for permission to use their song Pariwartan, or Change, which you're hearing now, in this episode. And to Suraya Logan, for her work on Nepal Now's social media.
I'm Marty Logan. I wrote and produced this episode and can be reached at marty@martylogan.net. I'll talk to you again soon.
(Listen to part 2 of this report)
Resources
Location of Chimling village, Mankha Municipality
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Music by audionautix.com.
Thank you to PEI in Bankhundole and Himal Media in Patan Dhoka for the use of their studios.
Nepal Now is produced and hosted by Marty Logan.
