Nepal: Introduction

Nepal is a landlocked country in South Asia and is bordered by China and India. It is located in the Himalayas and contains eight of the world's ten highest peaks. The government system is a federal parliamentary republic; the chief of state is the president, and the head of government is the prime minister. Nepal has a traditional economic system in which the majority of the population engages in subsistence agriculture, and the allocation of available resources is made on the basis of primitive methods. Nepal is a member of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC).