Our latest Everest Base Camp and Build and Trek expeditions have had something of a challenging time. Delayed from their original November 2020 and 2021 dates to October/November 2022 because of the pandemic, the teams have continued to raise funds for the project. The new Vocational Centre will be run by the Nepal Youth Foundation, our business partner in Nepal. The Centre will provide young people from across Nepal with the opportunity to learn a trade such as plumbing, electrics, carpentry and tailoring so that they can return to their distant villages and start a business. This keeps the skilled workforce in Nepal, adds to the economy and retains the workforce, rather than losing them to work abroad in the Middle East for poor wages and sometimes in dire conditions. 

 

Our 2022 Build and Trek team spent many days working on site shifting bricks, digging trenches and laying bricks to support the local builders. Hard, but
meaningful work and immensely satisfying. 

 

The Centre is based on an incredibly successful model that already operates, where over 3,000 young students have been trained and graduated to start their new vocation. The new Centre should be ready for operation in June 2023, and heralds the development of a strategy that may mean other similar Vocational Centres are set up across Nepal to provide more local training for enthusiastic young people. We hope to be closely involved in that exciting development.