Joe Manickavasagam, the World Bank resident representative for Nepal, has praised Nepal’s economic performance from July 1993 to June 1994, saying that the country recorded a 7.8 percent growth of GNP because of a good harvest - a growth rate higher than the bank’s expected six percent prediction. During an informal briefing to journalists on the World Bank’s Annual Report 1994 he said the average economic growth rate for South Asia was “quite good” at 5.2%. The report says, in Nepal “steps are underway to liberalise trade and industrial policies, unify the exchange rate, and attain full convertibility on the current account”. People’s Review, 29 September 1994