Corporate Social Responsibility in Nepal

The chapter examines the current status of CSR practices in Nepal encompassing four critical issues: (1) awareness and perception of stakeholders (customers and employees) towards the CSR practices of firms; (2) corporate understanding and general CSR practices of Nepali firms; (3) the regulatory and government policy regime towards promoting responsible business; and (4) current status of university syllabi on CSR education. The interface between business and society has been typical in Nepal, a relatively small (48th big country in the world), land-locked but resourceful nation situated in South Asia, with the population of 28.98 million; it is a least developed country (LDC) with developing business sector. Based on the available CSR study, which is relatively under-researched in Nepal, the paper synthesises the findings under the four critical areas. First, customer awareness of CSR practices of their sellers is on gradual rise, and the buyers even make it a point to base their buying decisions on how well the firms have discharged their social responsibilities while employees perceive their employers’ CSR performance as a factor to influence their work attitude, job satisfaction and commitment. Second, ambiguity about the CSR definition and domains is prevalent in the corporate sector, and philanthropic CSR is still dominant on all other domains. The lukewarm response of businesses to the business codes of conduct highlights the prevalence of ‘who will bell the cat’ syndrome, despite high rhetoric of the business leaders. Third, through the new regulatory provisions, Nepal government has made a policy shift to make CSR activities mandatory rather than voluntary, as Nepal now straddles now between the voluntary and compulsory CSR regimes. Finally, among the eight universities in the country, Nepal Open University and Tribhuvan University have offered full-fledged, exclusive CSR modules in both bachelors and masters programmes of the Management stream while other varsities have just lagged behind. Yet, there is enough room to improve the pedagogy and develop teaching faculty.