Helvetas Nepal

Nepal is one of Helvetas's oldest and largest country programmes, dating to 1956, when Swiss cheese-making and dairy support in the eastern hills started what became a 70-year presence. The country office is in Bakhundole, Lalitpur, with programme offices across Karnali, Sudurpaschim, Lumbini, and Koshi provinces. Its signature work is trail bridges: Helvetas supported the building of thousands of suspension bridges across Nepal under what is now a government-led programme, and the engineering skills it transferred are still the national standard. Current lines include water supply and sanitation, skills training and employment (the Enhanced Skills for Sustainable and Rewarding Employment programme and others), safer labour migration, local governance support under federalism, climate-resilient agriculture and market systems, and disaster risk reduction. Delivery is mostly through local governments and NGO partners, with Helvetas providing technical support, and much of the portfolio is SDC-funded.

For Nepalese professionals Helvetas is one of the larger INGOs in the country by national headcount. It hires project and programme managers, team leaders for large SDC-funded projects, civil and water engineers, agriculture and market systems specialists, skills development and employment officers, local governance and public finance advisers, gender equality and social inclusion specialists, MEAL and knowledge management officers, and communications staff. Support roles cover finance, grants, HR, procurement, logistics, admin, and IT. Nearly all posts are national contracts under Nepali payroll, with only a handful of expatriates, and pay sits in the mid-to-upper INGO band, roughly comparable to CARE and Plan. Because of the engineering portfolio it is one of the few INGOs with a steady demand for civil engineers, and the provincial offices in Karnali and the far west open positions more often than Kathmandu.