PurposeThis paper explores entrepreneurs' expectation from the new provincial government to protect sociocultural values for promoting touristic city – Pokhara, Nepal.Design/methodology/approachThe purposive sampling technique was applied to source the information from the respondents resided at Pokhara. Structured questionnaire techniques and cross-sectional descriptive method were used to collect data from 393 tourism entrepreneurs to explore their understanding and existing situations.FindingsAbout 85.5% of the respondents argue that the new government system has affected their business and 58.27% feel procedural complexities due to new political administrative system. Natural beauty, growing pollution, unmanaged urbanizations, good flow of the tourists and sustainability of the touristic city resulted as main aspects of Strength, Weakness, Opportunity and Threats. The entrepreneurs expect that newly formed provincial government should provide business security, formulate appropriate tax policy and provision for business insurance scheme for smooth operation, growth and sustainability of their tourism entrepreneurship.Research limitationsThe research was taken in Pokhara, only the entrepreneurs mostly resided at Lakeside were taken and wider research across the whole city would give a more balanced perspective.Practical implicationRecommendations are made with the aim of uplifting entrepreneurship milieu in the touristic city Pokhara in order to promote tourism business of Pokhara.Social implicationThis research can help local authority to take local residents' and entrepreneurs' experience into consideration for creating better plan and policies for the well-being of Pokhara.Originality/valueThis is the first paper to provide data from the perspective of entrepreneurs' expectation from newly formed Gandaki provincial government in Pokhara, Nepal.

This paper estimates the perceptions, determinants and barriers regarding the adoption of climate change adaptation options among Nepalese rice farmers. A multi-stage sampling technique was used to source respondents for the study, and structured questionnaire techniques were used to collect data from 773 households across seven districts (3 from Terai and 4 from the hilly region of Nepal). A binomial logistic regression model was used to detangle the determinants for the adoption of climate change adaptation options among farmers. The results revealed that approximately 80.7% of the farmers perceived change in temperature, and 90% believed that there was a decrease in rainfall in the 30-year period. In total, 77% of farming households responded that rice production and yield has decreased due to such changes, which has forced them to adopt available adaptation options. This study found that 12 adaptation options have been mainly used by rice farmers, and among them, there has been an increasing use of chemical fertilizer, climate-smart rice verities, and changes in nursery date, which are the first three adoption options. Overall, 71% of farmers adopt such adaptation options to protect themselves from perceived risk. However, farmers are facing several barriers, such as capital inadequacy, high cost of agricultural inputs, poor adaptation information provided to farmers, inadequate access to credit facilities and inadequate awareness about adaptation regarding the adoption of such options. Binomial regression results revealed that several factors influence a farmer's choice in adaptation measures. Our findings suggest the need for greater investment to remove these barriers and institutional shortcomings and help to improve a rice farmer's wellbeing.

This paper provides insight on how banking officials communicate with customers and how effective their techniques and tools are for development of banks. With the help of structured questionnaire technique, 373 customers having accounts in commercial banks in Nepal were interviewed in the month of April–September, 2019. Dummy based awareness index and Ordered Logit Regression Model were performed to understand customers’ perception on banking communication in Nepal. The Awareness Index shows that banking customers are moderately aware about banking communication while the Ordered Logit reveals that providing time to address customers’ problem and DEMAT facility were found to have significant relationship with banking communication awareness level. This study therefore indicates providing time to address customer’s problem and using DEMAT facilities experiences increases awareness in banking communication. This study contributes to the banking sector communication by transforming communication barriers for customers’ satisfaction.

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This study examines the climatic impact on wheat production in Terai of Nepal. This paper employs a Ricardian cross-sectional approach to estimates the relationship between wheat production and net revenue associated with wheat production in the plain area of Nepal (i.e. Terai) with different temperatures (average, maximum and minimum), precipitation and other traditional inputs like population density, seed, fertilizer, human labour, bullock labour and tractor. By using district level secondary data of 25 years, this study finds significant positive impact of the average and maximum temperature and significant negative impact of the minimum temperature on net revenue and wheat yield of the Terai region. Similarly, precipitation has mixed impacts. With the maximum temperature, increase in precipitation reduces net revenue and wheat yield whereas with average and minimum temperature, precipitation increases wheat yields as well as revenue. Other traditional inputs like population density, seed, manure, human labour and tractor used are positively associated with climatic change and increase net revenue as well as wheat yield whereas fertilizer and bullock used are negatively associated with climatic change and reduce net revenue and wheat yield.The Journal of Development and Administrative Studies (JODAS), Vol. 23(1-2), pp. 1-22

Nepal and India sustain bilateral relationship and share social, cultural, economic, political and geographical proximities contributing people of both nations to a number of advantages. This study analyzes socio-cultural, geo-political, and economic proximities contributing people of Sunauli-India/Nepal border exploiting purposive sampling in 429 respondents with a structured questionnaire survey in February 2018. Descriptive and inferential data analysis techniques are performed along with Logistic Regression Model to interpret the determinants of cross-border purchase. The result revealed 96.3% of the total respondents involved in purchase, out of them, 85.6%, 77.2%, 71.6%, 71.2% and 54.6% purchase due to economical price of the goods, festivals, communication access, habit and open border factors respectively. The empirical results of the binary logistic regression models revealed different effects of the factors on customers cross border purchase. Economical goods (2.727***), hassle free cross-border imports (1.952***), language similarities (1.551**) and goods available in local market (1.268**) significantly and positively affect the cross-border purchasing activities and the Odds Ratio of given variables is 15.28, 7.04, 4.71 and 3.55 respectively. Following the analysis, the study concludes that there is positive influence of socio-cultural characteristics in cross border purchase. Open border factor is equally important to stimulate such purchasing activities. More than other factors, economic characteristics as availability of goods, their types and economical price are all in all important.

Small business performance in open border is uncertain. Nevertheless, understanding it helps to explore socioeconomic factors affecting national and regional cross-border business activities. This study analyzes small business activities exploiting Psychic Distance Approach theory and econometric analysis with Logit model in 372 respondents involved in small business from Sunauli, Nepal-India border. The results indicate that the probability of influence of border side small business activities is higher with open border access, blockade and agitation in border area, communication access and homogeneity in customs, costumes and family management. Further, factors such as year(s) of business operation, family and business residing the other side of the border, annual income from the business, tax-evasion goods and use of agents to import goods substantially affect small business performance in open border region. Therefore, open border requires increase in cooperation, facilitation for cross border purchase, enhancement of appropriate market information and communication, proper regulation and monitoring at border point in strengthening and enhancing healthy cross-border small scale business performance.

The inflow of tourists determines development, growth and sustainability of tourism business worldwide. The main dilemma of tourism entrepreneurs remains in whether to follow westernization or to preserve the local sociocultural identity. This research tries to explore the entrepreneurs' perception about Western influence in business culture of the touristic city-Pokhara, Nepal. Cross-sectional descriptive study design is used to understand entrepreneurs' perception, and three dummybased indices are used to measure the tourism business environment. The ordered logit regression model is adopted to check the determinant factors. It reveals that English language for communication (76.84%), Hospitality service (72.01%), Art and Decoration (68.19%) and Festivals and Cultural Performances (55.47%) have Western influences on tourism entrepreneurship in Pokhara. The results of the ordered logit model show that the overall odds of business registration, government initiation, westernization and population growth are 1.09, 1.26, 2.14 and 2.27 times respectively which signifies to potentially better business prospects provided Western culture influences are minimized while local identities are preserved under government initiatives. This research was conducted only in a dense area of Pokhara called Lakeside. We have reasons to believe that if the research could have covered the whole area and all the entrepreneurs were included, it would produce much greater picture of the westernization influences in business culture of Pokhara.