Nepal

Nepal: Moderate Governance Scores, Modest Military Footprint

Nepal's GDP reached $42.91 billion in 2024, per the World Bank's World Development Indicators, with GDP per capita of $1,447 the same year and a population of 29.65 million. Government debt stood at 49.6 percent of GDP for 2026 on the IMF's World Economic Outlook, while reserves — per the World Bank's own WDI series rather than IMF data — stood at $15.85 billion in 2024.

Defense spending is light relative to the size of the economy. SIPRI's 2025 military expenditure data puts outlay at roughly $428.29 million, or 0.966 percent of GDP on SIPRI's own GDP series — a ratio that should not be checked against the World Bank's $42.91 billion GDP figure cited above, since the two series are not interchangeable. The Correlates of War National Material Capabilities (NMC) dataset lists 97,000 active personnel as of 2022 and a composite index of national capability (CINC) of 0.0018 for that year — a sizable force relative to the modest spending figure above, though the personnel count predates the 2025 financial data by three years.

Governance indicators sit in the middle of the range this dataset tracks. V-Dem's 2025 data (v15) scores Nepal at 0.656 on electoral democracy, 0.505 on liberal democracy, and 0.662 on state capacity.

Energy data shows a country with limited domestic production. Our World in Data's energy series lists primary energy consumption of 0.207 exajoules in 2023 and electricity generation of 11.13 terawatt-hours in 2024. Both oil and gas production are recorded as zero, dated to 2016 — consistent with Nepal having no significant domestic hydrocarbon output, though the dating means this cannot be confirmed as a current-day figure rather than an old data point that happens to read zero.

Data gaps

Oil and gas production figures are sourced to 2016 and are a decade old; while both read zero, that reading should be treated as the most recent data point available rather than a confirmed current state. Reserves are drawn from the World Bank's WDI series rather than IMF IFS, which is used for several other countries in this set, so cross-referencing reserve figures against those countries would not be an apples-to-apples comparison. No arms-trade, nuclear, or alliance data appears in this bundle.

Sources: World Bank WDI, IMF WEO, SIPRI Milex, COW NMC, V-Dem v15, Our World in Data (Energy).