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Nepal is rich in biodiversity represented by 118 ecosystem types. In a span of 800 km by 200 km, diverse arrays of wildlife species have been recorded. However, many of these components of biodiversity are facing existential crises, most of them due to anthropogenic influences. Amphibians are one such group of species, which are experiencing such threats. Some charismatic species such as tiger, rhino and snow leopard have received privileged treatment while the ‘non-charismatic’ species such as amphibians are shrouded in shadow.

All three types of amphibians are found in Nepal, namely frogs, salamanders and caecilians. There are six families of frogs in Nepal that includes 57 species. However, lack of studies about amphibians means scant information is available about their distribution. 

Environmental conditions like temperature, soil moisture and rainfall determine the occurrence of amphibians and the richness of their habitats. Amphibians prefer agricultural land, grassland, forestland and wetlands. 

Besides, amphibians play significant roles in the ecosystem by acting as both prey and predator. They keep pests like mosquitoes under control, help maintain the quality of water, contribute to crop yields and public health. 

Despite such an important role, these ‘non-charismatic’ species are not the focus of our conservation efforts.

Frogs are on the decline, due mainly to habitat degradation, conversion of wetlands to wasteland and a belief that they have certain medical values, a reason behind their consumption. Unplanned urbanization has become a major cause in developing countries like Nepal behind a shrinking habitat. 

A study has shown a significant relation between the roads and the occurrence of frog species in the Kathmandu Valley. Enhancing developmental activities like construction of road and other infrastructure could result in biodiversity loss, pushing the amphibian species on the verge of extinction. Furthermore, it is not a good practice to encourage students to use thousands of species killed annually for the purpose of dissecting frogs as a sample in practical courses.

To draw attention toward the poor status of frogs, Environment Protection and Study Center (ENPROSC) and Companions for Amphibians and Reptile for Nepal (CARON) initiated a program titled crocking monsoon in 2013, followed in 2019 by a citizen science-based approach with Wildlife Conservation Nepal (WCN), which has again highlighted a poor status of these creatures. 

Notably, this program started frog surveys across the country during the Covid pandemic with the aim of raising public awareness on the species, conducting research and identifying the species. 

This program mobilized volunteers across all seven provinces and 51 districts as citizen scientists, who, as district representatives, collected information (photos, videos) about frogs that used to be found in their respective localities. 

The year 2020 saw the submission of 1300 individual submissions of frog species using kobo collect application, followed by 1000 submissions in 2021. 

There’s a dominant mindset that only larger species deserve conservation, meaning that even governments across the world, including in Nepal, think that ‘non-charismatic’ species are not worthy of conservation. 

This program dedicated to ‘non-charismatic’ species, like several such conservation programs around the world, is in crisis for want of economic support. 

In this context, March 20 is an important date to remind the whole world of the need to conserve ‘non-charismatic’ species like frogs. Different stakeholders, including NGOs, organize awareness programs at different schools on the World Frog Day to raise awareness on the importance of frogs with a hope that those behind the decimation of the species will transform themselves into conservationists one day.

Summing up, tailored conservation approaches are necessary for sustainable conservation of amphibians. In our context, how about changing the syllabi suggesting amphibian species for dissection and exploring other alternatives?

Political chaos

Governments, whoever is a head to lead in support of different political parties, have frequently been changing in Nepal, thanks to a stubborn will to capture—and remain in—power. Nonetheless, these parties have no concrete plans and programs to make Nepal livable. Ethics, principles and values are what guide us to do something better, but what do the parties do with these ideals? They throw these ideals in the trash box, time and time again. 

Followers of our political parties and their leaders are visionless, political power is what the latter hanker for. And all that these visionless leaders do is misuse the resources at their disposal to fulfill petty interests of a small group at the expense of development agendas that benefit the country and the people. The leaders easily change their colors and ignore guiding principles to gain and remain in power. 

By ‘working’ tirelessly for the sake of power, these leaders have been pushing the country toward a state of lawlessness. 

It is foolish to dream of socio-economic development amid a deepening political instability exacerbated by our leaders, who have neither any rationality to use resources in the gainful sector nor critical thinking to push the development agenda forward.

Economic woes

Nepal’s ailing economic sectors hardly have any job opportunities for the youths. This is a far cry from a not-so-distant past, when the farm sector used to provide seasonal employment to a sizable population. Apart from agriculture, other sectors capable of rejuvenating the national economy, namely cottage industries, tourism and hydropower are also not performing well. 

The private sector can play a vital role in speeding up development but what can it do in the absence of a policy to bring it into the mainstream of development? 

For want of employment opportunities at home, youths are flying to foreign shores in search of jobs while about 60m people (roughly 20 percent of the national population) continue to live under absolute poverty. Add to it relative poverty, which roughly accounts for over 60 percent of the national population. 

This grim scenario is forcing young people to head abroad for jobs and become the source of remittance, making it the mainstay of the domestic economy. 

Education flaws

That our education sector has not been firing on all four cylinders (to say the least) is a given. In a sharp contrast, the India education system has been producing highly-skilled human resources not only for the home country but for the whole world. Most of the chief executive officers of global giants are from India. 

Two probable factors ail Nepal’s education system: Lack of a calendar to conduct exams and publish results, and low-quality education. The latter is the result of heavy politicization of institutions responsible for delivering higher education. A conducive environment for learning, teaching and undertaking research is lacking as evidenced by a decline in enrollments. 

Poor governance

Corruption and smuggling scandals come to the surface all too often, presenting a clear proof of weak governance. Probes into these cases show the involvement of politicians and bureaucrats. These cases are the result of politicians using power to divert public money for private gains. 

Bribery, corruption and smuggling are rampant because of poor governance and rent-seeking behavior on the part of our ruling elites. Because of this behavior coupled with favoritism and nepotism, commoners are not getting effective services from relevant state institutions. 

Given this context, the people need to raise their voices and make the ruling elites accountable if they want to make this country livable. 

It is often believed that crises open up avenues for opportunities. The whole world witnessed the global health crises of Covid-19 that triggered widespread panic and resulted in loss of lives, while businesses closed down due to the economic downturn. Yet, several governments and people learnt and developed strategies to cope with such situations, and many of them worked well. On the positive side, there is a realization that we need a certain strategy to cope with a certain crisis. This is because crises often trigger a sense of urgency, thus actuating solutions. And when crises mitigation strategies are explored through collaborative deliberations, that would certainly cultivate perspectives for change. A perfect example of this was the International Community Forestry Conference held on March 4-5 in Kathmandu.

The conference was conceived to not only bring together national and international researchers, practitioners, activists and policy-makers, but also to reflect on the achievements and emerging challenges facing the community forestry in Nepal.

An innovative program

Nepal’s community forestry has witnessed four decades of experimentation, adaptive management and expansion across the country. Not only has it evolved into a robust system of devolving management and resource use rights to local communities through legally-recognized and perpetually self-governed institutions, it has also functioned to sustain and improve the lives of those who rely on forests. More than 22,000 registered groups operate across the country, and have benefited 16.6m people through the management of over 1.8m hectares of forests. With decades of experimentation and institutionalization, there is a wider consensus on the positive contributions of community forestry in Nepal. Yet, with fundamental shifts in the socioeconomic context of the country, due mainly to increasing outmigration, demographic changes, shifts in agricultural practices, whether people-forest relations still remain the same is a moot question. One of the central highlights of the conference was that Nepal’s community forestry is at a crossroads, while some emphasized that it is struggling to overcome ‘crises’.

At a crossroads

In recent years, there is a growing concern over efficacy and impact of community forestry, mainly in terms of its economic rationale. In fact, a large body of research has emerged, confirming that community forestry’s contribution to the livelihoods of people is currently much less than its actual potential. Most of the problems have been attributed to arbitrary policy decisions and lack of institutional capacity, both on the part of the government agency as well as the community forest groups themselves. Nevertheless, the problem does not end there. 

The community groups seem to lack enthusiasm to capitalize on the legal space that has been progressive in the last few years, especially following a federal restructuring of the country. Several presenters at the conference argued that we are battling with a crisis, and most importantly the crisis of dwindling ‘collective action’, the fundamental pillar that community forestry of Nepal stood up on four decades ago.

While some presenters underlined the successful contribution of community forestry and ongoing shifts in the priority, others accentuated the factors leading to shifting forest-people relations. Most importantly, the outmigration and remittance economy has dominated the subsistence use of community forests, emerging livelihood opportunities in the domestic market are allowing people to shift their interests to city centers. On the grim side, economic returns from community forests have not been able to compensate for the people’s efforts in managing their forests. One of the presenters stated, the normative shift in people’s priority from “when will the forest open” to “no one comes to the forest these days” is an illustration of changing preferences in engaging with the forest. That has taken a toll on the traditional farming practices that we had for decades, including a decline in the number and type of livestock in rural areas. Several other presentations foregrounded proximate and underlying factors responsible for this, including increasing instances of human-wildlife conflict resulting in economic losses to rural households, forest fires, expanding invasive species within the forests and many more. All these factors, compounded by expired operational plans and lack of local capacity and support for their renewal, have resulted in a declining interest in community forestry.  

The legacy

The narrative on the theory of Himalayan Degradation, popularized by Eckholm in 1975, sparked a global concern about the impact of environmental degradation in Nepal. This in fact drew wider attention of the donors, giving rise to a sense of urgency to revert deforestation and forest degradation. This brought the donors, namely the Swiss, Australian and the British, among others, to provide support for addressing the environmental problem, and thus we witnessed the advent of community forestry in Nepal. With support from various donors, the interventions have had a remarkable impact on environmental, social and economic fronts of community forestry.

Four decades down the line, community forestry is still considered relevant, but rather from a broader perspective of climate change adaptation, biodiversity management and other dominant global environmental agendas that have evolved in recent years. However, the fundamental principles of community forestry that have bound the collective action among forest user groups has remained in the shadows. One of the persistent supporters of community forestry in Nepal is the Australian government.  Launched in 2013, the Australian Center for International Agricultural Research’s forestry project has mainly focused on contributing to the food security and livelihoods of community forest user groups through research in Kavre, Sindhupalchowk, and Lamjung districts, in pursuit of innovative options to silviculture management as well as have developmental impact through better policy outcomes.

The fundamental question is on whether the legacy of supporting core values and principles of community forestry still continues. Not only would this be important in terms of continuing the legacy, but also in terms of revitalizing one of the well-established local institutions of global reputation. So, community forestry is at a cross-roads of crises both in terms of intertwined problems facing it as well as the continuing support that would be supportive in addressing them.    

The author is executive coordinator at ForestAction Nepal

For decades, the internal political landscape of Nepal has been ruined by fragility and political discord. Despite the nation’s yearning for peace, prosperity and democratic governance, political leaders have consistently fallen short in addressing these fundamental aspirations. Among the political entities in Nepal, the Nepali Congress stands as one of the oldest and ostensibly the most committed to principles of liberal democracy, the rule of law, human rights and freedom. However, it has, regrettably, failed to live up to the expectations of the Nepali populace, who have looked to it for leadership in navigating the country toward a brighter future.

Internal power struggles, personal egos and political polarization have plagued Nepali politics since the democratic movement of the 1990s. Despite being the largest political party, the Nepali Congress has struggled to earn the trust of opposition factions, notably the CPN-UML. Conversely, the CPN-UML has often prioritized power dynamics over the nation-building agenda, further aggravating the challenges facing Nepali democracy. The Nepali Congress must acknowledge its shortcomings and learn from past mistakes to effectively address the evolving needs and challenges confronting the Nepalis. The Nepali Congress must shift its focus toward forging democratic alliances, articulating a comprehensive long-term economic vision and enhancing governance structures.

The ethos of the Nepali Congress, as envisioned by its founder Bishweshwar Prasad Koirala, emphasizes the importance of political ideology in guiding its actions. However, despite being identified as a center-left political party that promotes multiparty democracy, term-based elections, human rights, a free economy, and the rule of law, the Nepali Congress has struggled to consolidate democratic forces and collaborate effectively for national development. Over the past two decades, the Nepali Congress has engaged in alliances with various political entities, including radical Maoists, in its pursuit of governance. Yet, these alliances have often been short-lived, driven by the opportunistic pursuit of power rather than a genuine commitment to the nation’s welfare.

The recent political maneuvers of leaders like Dahal highlight the need for the Nepali Congress to recognize and respond to such instability and opportunism effectively. The Nepali Congress needs to strengthen its internal unity and construct a robust democratic alliance ahead of the forthcoming elections. This requires a clear and coherent communication of the party’s liberal political beliefs to the Nepali people, emphasizing the value of freedom and the obligation of a government that respects individual choices. The Nepali Congress should lead the effort to establish a larger ideological political party by bringing together smaller parties like the National Democratic Party, Madhesi Dals and the Rastriya Swatantra Party. Left-leaning political groups should undertake similar initiatives. This would offer the Nepalis a choice between two major political entities, fostering a stronger and more stable government.

From an economic standpoint, the Nepali Congress has championed a free-market approach, leading to some degree of economic growth. Nevertheless, political instability and socialist rhetoric have significantly hindered Nepal’s economic progress. Furthermore, socialist principles entrenched in Nepal’s constitution have deterred domestic and foreign investors from freely investing in the country. To tackle these systemic and ideological challenges, the Nepali Congress must unveil a pragmatic and sustainable economic agenda that aligns with the aspirations of the Nepali people. This entails avoiding unrealistic pledges and false hopes peddled by competing left-leaning political parties.

Moreover, the Nepali Congress must spearhead discussions on the necessity of a streamlined and efficient government structure. While decentralization, including federalism, is integral to accommodating Nepal’s diverse landscape, the proliferation of bureaucracy poses a significant financial burden on the nation. This is an opportune moment for the Nepali Congress to advocate for a more effective and lean government structure, capable of delivering essential services to the people without undue complexity or financial strain.

Nepali Congress must prioritize ideological clarity, realistic economic policies and efficient governance structures to regain the trust and confidence of the Nepali people. By learning from past mistakes and embracing a vision centered on the nation's well-being, the Nepali Congress can chart a course toward a more prosperous and democratic future for Nepal. Rebuilding trust among the Nepali people is essential for the party to acknowledge the significance of accountability and transparency in governance. Upholding these principles not only enhances public confidence but also promotes good governance and sustainable development. The Nepali Congress’ experiences offer valuable guidance for navigating the complexities of Nepali politics and governance, offering lessons pertinent not only to the party but also to Nepal's broader political arena.

The opinions expressed in this article are the author’s sole responsibility and do not reflect the views of any organization with which he is professionally affiliated