Nepal's National AI Policy Targets 5,000 Specialists and School-to-University AI Curricula — Against a 58% School-Infrastructure Gap

On 14 August 2025, Nepal's Cabinet approved the National AI Policy 2082, drafted by the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology. Its education provisions plan to introduce AI-related subjects ‘from school level through university,’ support personalised and adaptive learning, and set a target of training at least 5,000 qualified AI specialists nationally; the policy also encourages AI development in local languages to reach non-English speakers.
Independent Nepali press coverage (Kathmandu Post) confirms the policy's approval, targets and provisions. An independent opinion analysis in The Himalayan Times cross-checked the policy's classroom ambitions against Nepal's Ministry of Education infrastructure data and found that only 58.1% of government schools have any ICT infrastructure, 43.1% have broadband connectivity, and just 25.1% have an IT lab — while teachers already report salary pressure and heavy workloads that make nationwide AI training difficult to deliver as written.
This is a policy commitment, not yet an implemented programme: no school has yet reported delivering the promised AI curriculum, and the cited critical analysis argues the education provisions are ‘overly ambitious’ relative to current capacity, risking wider inequality between well-resourced and under-resourced schools if rollout is not sequenced to infrastructure. It is included here as an honestly-scored, evidence-light policy commitment rather than a proven practice.

Read the full analysis: https://kathmandupost.com/money/2025/08/16/nepal-rolls-out-ambitious-ai-policy