Nepal’s $4000 fee scheme for clean Mount Everest ‘fails’; now, hopes pinned on a new clean-up strategy

According to a report by British broadcaster BBC, a climber generates an estimated 12 kg of waste during a six-week expedition. Thus, there is a surplus in the waste accumulation under the ‘8kg deposit scheme’.

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Until recently there were no checkpoints above the Khumbu Icefall, which made it impossible to track and verify where the waste was coming from and where was it being abandoned.

While speaking to the BBC, Nepal’s tourism ministry and mountaineering department officials said most of the deposit is refunded over the years. Often, it means the climbers brought back a portion of their own trash and it doesn’t help in the overall clean-up of the mountain.

Five-Year Cleaning Strategy but experts say it’s too late

A new plan was developed after the Supreme Court ordered the regulation of the number of climbers to save Mount Everest from being a garbage dump. The official draft of the Clean Mountain Strategy (2025-2029) proposed a Rs 308 million fund, but industry experts have estimated that the actual cost will exceed Rs 1 billion over five years.

The plan, launched last month, intends to bring about a specialised team of climbers called “Mountain Rangers”. The team will monitor waste management at Everest Base Camp and higher altitude camps.

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The plan incorporates the usage of drones to collect waste from higher altitudes and piloting of climbers using GPS-based tracking system.

The proposed plan, requires the climbers to pay a refundable garbage deposit, a non-refundable environmental fee of the same amount $4,000. The fee will flow directly into a permanent Mountain Welfare Fund.

The aim of this payment strategy is follow the principle of “polluter pays”. But Nepal’s Industry leaders say it is late for this proposed plan to succeed. President of Expedition Operators Association Nepal, Dambar Parajuli told Kathmandu Post they had proposed a $100 non-refundable fee per climber in 2010 and that if the plan had been implemented the fund would have exceeded Rs 1 billion by now which was the estimated minimum suggested by the industry experts for the new plan.

$15,000 permit fee introduction

The climbing permit fees, too, was raised from $11,000 t0 $15,000 since 2015.  After the revision, winter and monsoon permits cost $2,750 and the autumn permits cost $7,500.

A much stricter 1:2 guide-to-climber ratio has also been implemented. This means that every two climbers attempting to scale Everest or any other peak above 8,000 metres must hire one guide. For mountains below 8,000 metres, a guide is needed for every 15 climbers.

Himal Gautam, director at the Department of Tourism Nepal, was quoted as saying that the issuance of autumn climbing has started with the new rates and the records show a 719 success certificates.

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