Banepa, an old market town of 15,000, situated along a long and narrow vale just outside the eastern rim of Kathmandu Valley, is ideally located to serve as a satellite to metropolitan Kathmandu. It is already a trade and transportation hub to be reckoned with, and could help absorb the unchecked expansion that is presently underway in the Kathmandu towns.
Under its resident traders, Banepa has developed as the most dynamic township on the Amiko Highway, linking Kathmandu with Lhasa through the border post ofKodari. Today, Banepa serves as a staging point for the hills east of Kathmandu, in particular the districts of Kavre Palanchok, Sindhupalchok, Dolakha and Ramechap. The opening of the Lamosangu-Jiri road in 1984 enhanced the town´s reach, and there was a spurt of investment in buses and mini-buses by the business community here.
Banepa can be developed to provide off-farm employment to the people of the surrounding region and beyond, and it can serve as a distribution center for consumer goods and collection point for local produce. It can be the hub for the agricultural, educational and social services for which people might otherwise have to travel to Kathmandu.
For all its potential, however, Banepa has a long way to go. It does not yet have the required services and commercial base to serve Kathmandu as a satellite town. Today, itplays only a limited rote as a collection center for rural produce such as potatoes, beans and milk. There is little processing of local products for added value, except the rudimentary processing of rice, mustard oil and beaten rice, chiura. The town´s roleis limited to acting as a distribution center for urban consumer goods such as biscuits, cigarettes, sugar, "Mansuli" rice and imported cloth.