The Nepal Weekly 
August 15, 2023
Nepal government is considering to increase the royalty to get permission to climb the Everest by US Dollar 4,000 to 15,000 after two years. “We are considering for a new royalty fee of US D 15,000 per person for a foreigner desirous to climb Mt. Everest, from 2025,” said Yuvaraj Khatiwada, spokesperson at the Department of Tourism.
To get a permission for climbing the 8,848.86 metre tallest mountain in the world, a foreigner currently needs to pay US D 11,000 royalty and a Nepali climber is required to pay Nrs. 75,000. The government last time reviewed the royalty in January 2015.
Any foreign climber can scale the Everest from South Face (Nepal side) by paying US D 11,000 fee at present. Prior to 2015, an expedition with a maximum of 15 members used to cost US Dollar 10,000 per person. Now there is no group provision since then and a uniform fee of US Dollar 11,000 per foreign climber is being charged.
The government is also making it mandatory for the expedition agencies to bring back the dead bodies from the mountain. There has been growing trend of leaving the bodies on the mountain despite having insured. It highly costly to make arrangements for retrieving the dead body from the mountain.
In this spring season, 17 climbers died while climbing the Everest from Nepal side. In April 2014, 16 Nepali Sherpa guides died on the Everest when the mountain was hit by an unexpected avalanche. The next year, when Nepal witnessed the great earthquake 20 people were killed on the Everest base camp in an avalanche triggered by the tremor.
