The last 3-4 years have seen an unprecedented number of women and girls entering employment in Nepal as restaurant workers. In the past, in Nepal as in other countries in South Asia, men and boys have almost entirely dominated this sector of employment. Due to relaxation of social restrictions on females entering formal employment coupled with a quickly growing demand for formal employment among Nepalese women, many thousands are now employed as waitresses, hostesses, etc. in restaurants throughout the country. A survey of female restaurant workers in Kathmandu (Meet Nepal, 2003) showed that 59% of those interviewed were married, although many of these were responsible for female-headed households. Perhaps as many as one-fourth of female restaurant workers (including many of those married) are children, below the age of 18.

Women and girls employed in the restaurant industry have taken such employment for a number of reasons: many have been displaced from their families/communities in rural areas due to the present conflict; many have been forced to live independently, often with their children, due to domestic violence; and many have been displaced from previous employment due to closure of many garment factories in the last few years.

Because most of the females in Nepal's restaurant industry have taken employment from severe economic need, they have had little power to assert their rights as workers. In consequence, according to two surveys of female restaurant workers (Meet Nepal 2003, Maiti Nepal 2003), many of these women and girls have been forced to work in extremely poor health and safety conditions, receive very low salary, are often denied wages or forced into indebtedness to their employers, and are frequently forced to conduct activities which are deleterious to their physical and social well-being, in particular entertaining male customers with the consequence of physical and sexual abuse.

Because these women and girls are without support or protection - either within the workplace or from being displaced from their family/community - it has been frequently noted that they are at extremely high risk of being trafficked into prostitution. A significant but unknown number of women and girls have 'disappeared' from restaurant workplaces, and most are presumed to have been trafficked into prostitution or other forms of harmful labour. In 2003, ILO-IPEC funded a small study with the National Human Rights Commission to investigate the risk of trafficking among female restaurant workers. This study will be completed in 2004.

Public concern has arisen over the conditions of female restaurant workers in Nepal. In 2003, a monitoring committee headed by the Chief District Officer of Kathmandu Municipality was formed in an attempt to address the issue. This 14-member committee includes union leaders, representatives from the Ministry of Women, Children and Social Welfare, representatives from Maiti Nepal, and representatives from the organization of workers in small restaurants: the Nepal Restaurant and Small Hotel Workers Association.

Observations of the working environments and interviews with employers and employees indicate a need to address the working conditions of this rapidly-growing sector of female employment, in order to prevent trafficking, remove children from the workplace, reduce incidents of physical and sexual abuse, reduce forced indebtedness, and provide the wages, benefits, working conditions and occupational safety as prescribed by national and international law.

As such Maiti Nepal with kind support from International Labour Organisation (ILO) has initiated 16 months project to prevent trafficking in the small hotel and restaurant sector and to withdraw girls from the hazardous working conditions.