KATHMANDU, MAY 13
A total of 274 schools with 760 blocks and over 4,700 rooms were built under the Emergency School Reconstruction Project with the total cost of around Rs 14 billion to support the reconstruction of disaster resilient schools in Gorkha, Dhading, Nuwakot, Makawanpur, Rasuwa and Lalitpur districts.
The reconstruction is based on the earthquake-resistant type design guidelines jointly formulated by Japan International Cooperation agency and ADB under the principle of 'Build Back Better'.
Central Level Project Implementation Unit under the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology had recently organised 'Closing ceremony of Emergency School Reconstruction Project' in Kathmandu in the presence of Minister of Education, Science and Technology Ashok Kumar Rai as the chief guest. About 100 participants representing the government, development partners, civil society, academia, and media were part of the ceremony.
The reconstruction of the school structures is part of the Emergency School Reconstruction Project supported by JICA. The project is being implemented by CLPIU under the MoEST. The ESRP was implemented based on designs and structural guidelines which complies with the Nepal National Building Code. All the 274 school buildings are reconstructed with multi-hazard resilient structures which are child, gender and disabled-friendly to provide improved learning environment for the students based on the concept of BBB which increases resilience not only physically but also socially.
Besides the school buildings, the support also includes classrooms well-equipped with furnitures, laboratories, early childhood development centres, separate toilet blocks for boys and girls, solar back up, playground, boundary fences and footpath pavement. Amongst the 274 schools, two of the schools in Lalitpur - Patan Secondary School and Namuna Machhindra Secondary School - were reconstructed with special designs. Namuna Machhindra Secondary School was reconstructed with the focus on providing a conducive learning environment for students with visual impairments.
Japanse Ambassador Kikuta Yutaka said, "Japan's assistance is not only limited to rebuilding and retrofitting of the schools, but also to build back further under the concept of 'The Build Back Better'."
He further said, "It contributes to the improvement of education services and earthquake resilience for sustainable socio-economic growth." He also expressed hope that the cooperation between Nepal and Japan would further strengthen the friendly relations between the two countries over the years."
Chief Representative of JICA Nepal, Okubo Akimitsu said JICA would make more efforts so that the children studying at the schools of ESRP could inherit the more resilient Nepali society in days to come.
A version of this article appears in the print on May 14, 2023, of The Himalayan Times.
