We are regular readers of your paper and its coverage of foreign aid. We are currently in the UK even though we live in Kathmandu. When you are away from the place you live in, you get a different angle on things. I do not understand our obsession with aid. Trade, and not aid, is the way out. I have a business here working with hemp. It could be the future for Nepal as it could make us self-sufficient. Aid makes us corrupt, greedy, and most of all it turns us into beggars. It also enables those who give aid to control those who receive it. Here is a radical idea for you to consider: if our hydropower potential is so great why don't we export it all to India and China and make it free for Nepalis? Use it to power cable cars. Stop building roads. No imported fossil fuel, no pollution. I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. It's time to think radical, and to start caring for Nepal and not just our pockets.

Udaya Thapa,
UK