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Following the earthquake in 2015, Caritas Nepal worked to improve lives and uplift people through its various disaster recovery programs. It implemented Nepal Earthquake Recovery Program and Gorkha Earthquake Recovery Resilience Program to facilitate holistic recovery in 16 earthquake affected locations in Dolakha, Sindhupalchowk, Kavrepalanchowk, Sindhuli and Dolakha.

More than ten thousand households were trained in livelihood recovery concerns and were provided inputs, and they are re-establishing and improving their livelihoods. The livelihoods pursued are in the sectors of agriculture, livestock raising, and poultry raising. Eight cooperatives have been strengthened and they are providing microfinance services to 6047 households. Soft loans are being provided by the cooperatives to their members to help them pursue economic recovery activities.

Disaster mainstreaming was done in all intervention sectors. Local disaster management committees were formed in eight locations and plans (LDRMP) prepared in two locations. Caritas Nepal facilitated ‘Surakshit Awas Afain Banau Aviyaan’ through which it provided full shelter support package. It included housing grants, social mobilization and technical support. The full shelter packages have reached more than 500 houses in Orang, 600 houses in Bulung, 435 houses in Kalika, and 200 houses in Thokarpa. There are also many beneficiaries of the program in Balthali and Chandenimandan.

The house construction effort was led by 1341 masons trained by Caritas Nepal on earthquake resistant construction and 192 people trained to become masons. When the earthquake struck, Sanjay Tamang, who then studied in the fourth grade, lost both of his parents. His house at Bigu, Dolakha, was also destroyed. Now he has an earthquake resistant stone mud masonry house to live in. He is now living with his grandparents. After such great loss, the new house has given their family hope.

Caritas Nepal has also strengthened the social spirit by introducing other programs to vulnerable groups. Within three years after the earthquake, a total of 2,467 earthquake affected households (12,335 people) had improved access to safe drinking water from 49 drinking water systems constructed by the local User Groups with the financial support of Caritas Nepal. In addition to this, Caritas Nepal also implemented programs that helped provide funds for referral support to more than two hundred people suffering from psychosocial trauma.

Jhari Prasad Mahato, 50, lives in Gulmeli neighborhood of Madi Municipality, Chitwan. But life hasn’t been easy for Mahato as he faces many difficulties pertaining to his livelihood, especially due to the flooding of local rivers. The Rakteni River, which flows near his neighborhood, gets flooded every monsoon. A few years ago, Jhari Prasad harvested the paddy on his 15 kattha land and was drying it when the flooded Rakteni washed away his whole produce at nighttime.

Similar is the story of Mohan Sah Kanu, 69, who lives in Madi-3, Naya Ratani neighborhood. Kanu, an active member of the local community disaster management committee, grows paddy, wheat and beans. In the past, he has had bitter experiences like sleepless night because of floods in the local river, which washed away his produce ready for harvest. To address this problem, the Government of Japan provided financial assistance of $442,839 equivalent to approximately 50.36 million Nepali rupees, to Shapla Neer Citizens’ Committee in Japan for Overseas Support, an international NGO based in Japan, to work with a Nepali partner NGO, Rural Reconstruction Nepal (RRN), to implement a disaster risk reduction (DRR) strengthening project in Chitwan District.

The grant assistance is being used to strengthen community resilience to disasters in Madi Municipality, one of the flood prone areas, located in Chitwan District under the One River, One Community program. The project has been working in close coordination with local government, stakeholders, and communities and undertaking different activities, including support for capacity development of local government and communities, and establishment and maintenance of disaster reduction infrastructures. The project is also developing capacity of local bodies such as the Local Disaster Management Committees (LDMCs), Ward Disaster Management Committees (WDMCs) and Community Disaster Management Committees (CDMCs) on disaster risk reduction and facilitate the cooperation between these committees and other stakeholders.

 It is supporting the establishment and maintenance of infrastructure such as river widening, gabions and embankments as well as retention walls and drainage systems. The communities are maintaining these structures in cooperation with the local government. Following the implementation of the project, local residents are heaving a sigh of relief. “We can sleep well now. We harvest our agricultural production safely. It makes us happier. There is no damage of household properties including pets,” says Kanu. The house of Madhuri Sah, Madi-5 Basantapur neighborhood was fully damaged by flood of Rakteni River twice within a 10 years period in past.

Many times, her house was safe from flood but household properties and utensils were swept way. The same condition had to be faced every year in monsoon. The project adopted the concept ‘One River, One Community’ covering 14 neighborhoods of river corridor from its up-stream to down-stream area. In the one-and-half years of the project, 2,583 meter long mud dam in river corridors have been built and 40 meter river span in down-stream and 20 meter wider river span in mid-stream area have been widened. A 2,550 meter long gabion embankment has been made in the high risk area of river corridor whereas, a 65 meter long stone masonry wall has been made in the most high risk area of river corridor.

‘One River, One Community’ is a concept to work focusing on a single river and covering entire neighborhoods of that river corridor. Entire neighborhoods from up-stream to down-stream area are considered as a single community. During the time of monsoon, river flood damages from up-stream to down-stream’s neighborhoods. So, to reduce damages of one risk spot, it is found scientifically that the risk is caused by any other area’s landscape. It is important for infrastructure’s design to cover the entire neighborhoods from up-stream to down-stream area of the river corridor based on the flood occurrence mechanism.

It is not only about making infrastructures, but also improving capacity of community people for disaster risk reduction and management. This concept aims to foster the relationship between communities of that river corridor for helping each other. The community played a vital role during construction through their labor and monitoring which have been greatly appreciated.

Nepal Maharishi Vedic Foundation works in affiliation with the International Foundation for Consciousness-Based Education (IFCBE) to introduce highly effective non-sectarian programs that improve educational outcomes, reduce stress and antisocial behavior, increase creativity and intelligence, and unfold the inner happiness of students and teachers of all cultural and educational backgrounds.

The International Foundation for Consciousness-Based Education (IFCBE) is a nonprofit, educational organization that provides practical, scientifically validated educational programs, technologies, and consulting services for new schools, existing schools, and after-school organizations. IFCBE offers Consciousness-Based Education(CBE) to enliven the full creative potential and inner happiness of every student and teacher, eliminate stress, and enliven total brain functioning. The key technologies of this program are the Transcendental Meditation and TM-Sidhi programs.

The Consciousness-Based education program is non-sectarian, and is easily integrated into any public or private school without making extensive changes to the existing curriculum or schedule. When students regularly practice the Transcendental Meditation technique, they begin to learn more easily, think more clearly and creatively, sit and focus on their schoolwork more calmly and enjoyably, and solve problems with less effort. Just as watering the root of a tree improves all parts of the tree—its leaves, flowers, branches, fruits—so this Unified Field technology (Transcendental Meditation), enlivens the Universal Field of Natural Law which nourishes and enlivens life everywhere for the peace and prosperity of everyone.

Regular experience of the Transcendental Meditation program has been shown to dissolve deep-seated stress in the individual, bringing marked reductions in hypertension, stroke, heart disease, and other stress-related illness. When practiced collectively in groups, this same program has been shown to effectively reduce societal stress, and tensions, causing associated reductions in crime and social violence, and an upsurge of peace and positivity throughout the population.

Specifically, published research confirms that collective practice of the Transcendental Meditation program and the advanced TM-Sidhi program, which includes Yogic Flying, by groups of several hundred to several thousand trained experts quickly neutralizes acute societal stress—including the ethnic, religious, and political tensions that fuel violence and conflict. Violence and conflict are thereby averted as tensions are calmed and as the enmity in an adversary is naturally defused.

Accessing and stimulating the most fundamental level of creation—the Unified Field—generates powerful waves of unity and coherence that permeate the collective consciousness of the whole population. The immediate, practical result is markedly reduced crime and social violence, and improved positive trends throughout society. These trends have been extensively researched and are a new phenomenon in the history of the social sciences.

Ipas works globally with a vision that every woman and girl has the right and ability to determine her sexuality and reproductive health. It seeks to expand the availability, quality, and sustainability of abortion and related reproductive health services, as well as improve the enabling environment for the services. Ipas believes that no woman or girl should have to risk her life or health because she lacks safe reproductive health choices. Access to sustainable and safe abortion comprises of various factors and actors cutting across the standalone health lens.

These actors and factors based on the principle of human rights from the onset of programs, policies, and projects formulate a sustainable ecosystem. The introduction of the human rights-based approach to health aims to realize the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health (right to health) and other health-related human rights through the interrelated and essential elements of availability, accessibility, acceptability, and quality (AAAQ).

To achieve balance and ensure a committed, responsive system for abortion care, Ipas is implementing a project called ‘Strengthening the Safe abortion Ecosystem in Nepal’ in line with Ipas Sustainable Ecosystem Framework, a dynamic condition by local stakeholders addressing multiple components to truly meet women’s safe abortion service needs keeping women centered care in the center of the program.

Intertwined with the programming components are the existential gender and social norms which might act as restraining or driving forces for sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) services. In addition to the prevalent social norms and knowledge among women, there are “other” factors or actors which might hinder the efforts to increase utilization of SRHR services by women and girls. It was felt important to understand the impact of such forces which are interlinked to the smooth implementation of program and increase access to services.

For this, Ipas used Force Field Analysis (FFA) and Social Norms Analysis Plot (SNAP) approaches to identify the associated social norms and other factors on selected program districts. The FFA provided the overall power structure and the position (agency, structure, or relations) where the power is stored to understand its navigation towards the positive or negative side for SRHR and safe abortion. SNAP helped to analyze how this power influenced the continuity of the harmful social norms.

In simple terms, by creating an inter-connectivity between both the tools, FFA helped Ipas develop a strategy regarding who and how it should work with, while SNAP helped us dissect the social norms that are inhibiting or driving these forces of power and implement the demand side activities and messaging. Two clusters from the interventions Palika of Province Lumbini and Sudurpaschim were selected. The clusters were selected based on the principle of social inclusion (marginalized and vulnerable areas) geographically remote and hard to reach for services.

The FFA was conducted with community women and girls of reproductive age whereas SNAP was conducted with the same participants from FFA along with the Men and Boys group 4 FFA and 3 SNAP tools were used in each selected areas. The findings of the study were crucial in identifying the areas of gender and social norms integration and guiding the pathway of the programs.