Biodiversity / Agriculture / Climate Change Adaptation

A goat farmer from Ghorahi Municipality responds to facilitators during the assessment of competitive advantages of economic development in the Municipality, February 2020. Copyright: GIZ/LPED

Members of a vegetable farmers group from Lamahi Municipality of Dang District harvesting vegetables grown in a riverbed. Copyright: GIZ/LPED

The overall objective of the project is:

• The framework conditions for local economic development in selected municipalities and value chains at local and provincial level are improved.

In 2021 the project integrated co-financing from the European Union (EU) and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Finland for the implementation of the action Green Resilient Agriculture Productive Ecosystems (GRAPE) which aims:

• To promote climate resilient, green economic growth of Sudurpashchim and Karnali provinces of Nepal.

The project strengthens the conditions required for economic development at municipal and provincial level as well as the research-oriented and research-based application of innovations by farmers and other value chain actors. By doing so, it strengthens income generation of marginalized households, socially disadvantaged groups, and women.

Combining the territorial economic development approach Local and Regional Economic Development (LRED) with action research, climate smart value chain development, and agricultural knowledge and information system building, the project ensures participatory planning and development.

An important partner in implementing the project is the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD). Cooperation with national and international universities and their students aims to build capacities for future challenges related to climate change and agriculture.

The project contributes to the Green, Resilient, and Inclusive Development (GRID) approach, which both the Government of Nepal (GoN) and the International Development Partners Group (IDPG) have adopted to pursue economic development with a long-term sustainability lens.

The project works in 27 municipalities of Lumbini, Karnali and Sudurpashchim Provinces in the west of Nepal.  It is being implemented under the guidance of the Ministry of Land Management, Cooperatives and Poverty Alleviation.

Financial Volume: € 18.35 Mio.

The project focuses on four fields of action:

• Economic Governance: This field of action supports strengthening of governance structures at municipalities level with the aim of creating an enabling environment for agriculture, agriculture-based business, investment and value chain development.
• Action research: This field of action supports the development of market oriented and site-appropriate innovation systems, in which household-based agricultural enterprises, cooperatives and MSMEs are supported by application-oriented research and capacity development for advisory services.
• Rolling out: This field of action supports the application of sustainable approaches identified through action research (see above) on a larger scale in the target clusters of selected municipalities.
• Up-Scaling: This field of action supports the sharing of instruments and best practices generated by the action to a larger audience of actors on provincial, national level and regional level thus supporting scaling-up of climate-resilient and water-efficient approaches in agricultural value chains.

Considering agricultural ecosystems, the core processes and activities until end of 2024 entail:

• Support to integrating climate-smart agriculture measures in local government planning and budgeting
• Conduct action research on climate-smart agriculture at community level and train related sector stakeholders
• Strengthen agricultural value chains by improving the resilience of production and including backward and forward linkages
• Policy advice, joint learning and networking for future cooperation