Kathmandu, Oct. 26 -- Even as Nepal tries to recover from the impact of the pandemic, the country's economic indicators released this week by the central bank show dismal performance in the first two months of the fiscal year.

The report by the Nepal Rastra Bank shows that Nepal's foreign currency reserves fell to $11.1 in mid-September, 6.6% below the figure for last year, this is enough to pay for only 8 months oftotal imports.

Even more worrying is thatoverseas remittances that had held steady despite the pandemicfor the past two years have now started declining. Nepalis abroad sent home Rs155 billion in the past year, which is 6.3% below the same period last year.

Despite the pandemic, remittances had risen by 8.1% in fiscal year 2...