Friendship Bridge Boosting Nepal and China Bond

Every day, the Nepal-China border bridge -- the Friendship Bridge -- was flocked with Nepalese carrying blankets, stuffed toys, utensils they have just bought in town of Zhangmu in China's Tibet that is located on one end of the Nepal-China Friendship Bridge.

Friendship Bridge has been playing a crucial role for Nepalese to visit Zhangmu, shopping and doing business.

"Each day, more than 500-600 Nepalese cross the bridge to visit China for many purposes, " said Pahal Thapa Chettri, Customs Officer at Nepal's Tatopani port.

He also said that each day as many as 250 Chinese people doing business or for travel cross the bridge to enter Nepal.

"Nepalese people crossed the bridge to buy the popular Chinese goods for self use or resale," Chettri said. In addition, many Nepalese people want to feel that "once in life I have stepped in China" as the Nepalese are heavily influenced by the progress of their oldest neighbor.

"Without the Friendship Bridge, nothing could have been linked and flourished: there would be no business, no transportation, and this area would not have been developed as the trading point," he added.

For 29-year-old Goma Ghale, crossing the border is almost a weekly practice as she is a business woman based in the near by town of Bharabise some kilometers away from the capital Kathmandu.

"My father was a businessman and I took over his work and we have been selling the Chinese goods for years," Ghale said.

This time, she had bought a few rice-cookers which she will be reselling at a fixed price without bargain.

Mohan Pathak, who came to visit the place, said that he had never had an idea that he could buy a handful of things at such a reasonable price.

"If we had not had this bridge we would have been backward in many terms," he added.

Pathak, a hotelier based in Kathmandu said he would be bringing more money as well as his family to shop around in the area.

China is set to provide Nepal with assistance and technology for constructing a dry port in Tatopani which links Nepal and China through the "friendship bridge" which was inaugurated in the year 1985.

Trade with Tibet had totaled 131 million U.S. dollars in the period from mid-July 2010 to mid-July 2011, up from 94 million dollars from the year before.

As per the Chinese official statistics of 2011, the total trade volume between Nepal and China stood at 1.2 billion dollars which has been increased by 61 percent.

Likewise, Nepal's export to China stood at 14 million dollars which has also been increased by 21 percent.

Also the Chinese tourists visiting Nepal in the year has been recorded as 75631 which have increased by 63.14 percent.