ANSAB receives the first prize of the Adaptation at Scale Karyanwayan Prize

ANSAB receives the first prize of the Adaptation at Scale Karyanwayan Prize

ANSAB’s ecosystem based commercial agriculture (ECA) initiative has received the first prize of the Adaptation at Scale Karyanwayan (Implementation) Prize in the category of adaptation projects from the international/national level organizations. In an award ceremony held on May 23, 2019 in Kathmandu, the Honorable Minister for Forests and Environment Mr. Shakti Bahadur Basnet handed over the award to ANSAB’s Research, Planning and Communication Manager Mr. Sudarshan Khanal. The first award comes with a cash prize of GBP 100,000.

The Adaptation at Scale prize funded by the DFID-UK Department for International Development and managed by the consortium of IMC Worldwide, Integrated Development Society (IDS)-Nepal, Institute of Development Studies, South Asia Institute of Advanced Studies (SIAS), and Center of Green Economy Development (CGED)-Nepal, is awarded to the organizations that have successfully implemented programs to scale-up the climate change adaptation initiative to new communities and new geographic locations with proven positive outcomes for the poor and vulnerable communities. The award included a rigorous competitive process including review, field verification and final judging of the project activities implemented by the organizations. 18 organizations were shortlisted for the award from a pool of over 35 applicants, of which 10 organizations received the prize in different categories.

ECA program, envisioned by ANSAB, has the goal of transforming the conventional forestry and agriculture into climate smart, attractive and socially prestigious business. Designed and implemented in different bio-physical and socio-economic settings in Nepal, ECA focusses on the production and marketing of products and services in an ecologically sustainable, economically competitive, and socially justifiable manner. ECA is envisioned to generate wealth through increased economic productivity, involve local communities, improve the resilience of people to climate change, and generate integrated social impacts. With implementation of project activities in the eight districts of Nepal, the initiative has demonstrated increased crop and economic productivity through adoption of ECA practice, developed an agribusiness model and market system for “natural organic” products, and initiated promotion of enabling environment and value-chain governance through Public-Private-Community Alliance (PPCA).

ANSAB has been closely working with the Ashapuri Organics to develop it as the lead firm for the promotion of ECA value chain and the Jiri Municipality for the enabling environment and value-chain governance through PPCA. Ashapuri Organics has also been developed as the Experimentation and Demonstration Center for developing, testing and piloting farming, technologies, product development and business model in Nepal.