reflections on nepal capacity 21 initiative - Department of Applied ...

162. Launching SCDPBox 2: Integrated activities meet rural needs in NepalWhen Nepal's Capacity 21 programme began in 1997, three watermelon and vegetables, which have helped reduce vitaminpressing issues needed to be addressed. Acute deforestation deficiency in their village. Medicinal plants, plentiful in the past,and soil erosion were threatening biodiversity and causing are expected to return as the new forest matures. Villagersfloods downstream. Rural poverty was severe, and disease pay a small fee to harvest grass from the forest, which paysand malnutrition were widespread. Access to schools, the salary of a community forest guard.sanitation and health care was grossly inadequate. Deeprooteddivisions of gender and caste made collective action To support the creation of income-generation initiatives, SCDPdifficult. Which problem should take priority? The answer, of established the Sustainable Development Facility Fund (SDFF),course was, "all of them". With its Sustainable Community which offers credit to local communities. In addition to takingDevelopment Programme (SCDP), Capacity 21 made an loans from the SDFF, the Ghaatgaun CBO has mobilised itsambitious commitment: to address the economic, social and own capital through a community fund. Members borrow toenvironmental aspects of rural poverty in Nepal in an integrated, finance entrepreneurial activities, such as retail shops,cohesive manner, so that different types of initiatives could commercial poultry and pig farms, and cash crop cultivation. Asupport and enhance one another. "SCDP is probably the first scholarship fund has also been set up, and local children areproject in Nepal that has attempted, from day one, to come up attending school for the first time. "The integration ofwith a support package for the communities that would address environmental management and social and economicall their vital needs", says Kristiina Mikkola, Environmental development builds synergetic impacts, while addressingGovernance Advisor at UNDP in Kathmandu.communities' common problems", says Hum Bahadur Gurung,national programme manager ofSCDP chose three districts to workSCDP for Capacity 21.in, later expanding to six. It identifiedlocal NGOs to help launchIn the six districts, SCDP encouragesenvironmental, economic or social"green enterprises", including treeprojects in each district, and itnurseries, sustainable harvesting oforganised village developmentforest products such as herbalcommittees, each of which wouldmedicines, and apiculture, whichsupervise the activities of 30produces nutritious honey-a saleablecommunity-based organisations, oritem while promotion biodiversity. InCBOs. At least 80 percent ofone community, children planted fruithouseholds in a community join thetrees around their school, includinglocal CBO. Women participatebananas, which bore fruit the firstequally with men, and all castesyear, as part of an environmentalare represented. Today, someproject. Before long, the trees had37,800 households are membersbecome an income-generating assetof CBOs, with more than 185,000for the school.people benefiting from theiractivities.In another village, the social initiative of installing latrines hasbecome part of a biogas programme that provides an"People from all walks of life - poor and rich, men and womenareinvolved in community-based sustainable development improving nutrition and increasing family incomes, whilealternative source of fuel. Elsewhere, high-yield bananas areactivities," says Hari Shankar Tripathi, member of Nepal's promoting soil stability and helping to reduce run-off in theNational Planning Commission. "SCDP has harnessed the local watershed. "We are promoting a win-win situation",potential of local people to develop local leadership and says Ms. Mikkola of UNDP, "because community membersstrengthened their capacities to manage integrated social, select and prioritise their own activities."economic and environmental development programmes."Initially, each CBO chose one activity - environmental, social oreconomic -as the entry point that would address a pressinglocal concern. But after a short time, the distinctions betweenthe three types of activities began to blur. "We found that aftertwo or three months of implementation, if we were doing socialdevelopment, the people spontaneously began linking it toenvironmental activities that had an economic component",says Manoj Basnyat, former sustainable development advisorat UNDP, Nepal.In the village of Ghaatgaun in Surkhet District, CBO membersdecided their first priority was to restore a severely depletedforest on the banks of the Karnali River. They planted sixspecies of trees to reduce soil erosion, as well as fruit trees,The impact of SCDP has reached beyond the six target districts.Its approach will be incorporated into Nepal's next Five-YearPlan, in recognition of the contribution the programme hasmade towards poverty alleviation. A network of NGOs inwestern Nepal is implementing mini-projects that emulate theSCDP model, and the Canadian International DevelopmentAgency is currently formulating a Community EnvironmentalAwareness Programme similar to SCDP. "There is greatpotential for the SCDP approach to be expanded beyond thesix project district", says Mr. Tripathi of the PlanningCommission. "We are organising observation tours, so thatother communities can learn about the SCDP approach todevelopment".Source: UNDP/Global Capacity 21, 2001