I am a Himalayan American,” says Tsechu Dolma when asked about her nationality. At only 25, Dolma’s work and achievements are mountainously high, just like the terrains she loves to work in. A graduate of Columbia Univer­sity School of International and Public Affairs, Dolma has been active in social work from a very early age. She has also co-founded women and girls economic and social empowerment component of ACHA Himalayan Sister­hood in New York and advised UNDP in Colombia on natural resource man­agement and impact on indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities.

She runs indigenous honeybee farms, apple orchards, and greenhouses in the remote areas of the Nepali mountains. Ideally, the mountains are not considered the most lucrative terrains for agriculture and farming.

But with Dolma’s education, knowl­edge and persistence, she has been able to transform the areas she has worked in into profitable hubs of agro business, thus changing the lives of many farmers and their families especially women.

Her work as a social entrepreneur has been recognized by many organizations globally. She is a 2014 Brower Youth Award Winner, a 2013 Udall Scholar from the US Congress and 2017 Fulbright Hillary Clinton Fellow.

This young environmental scientist and anthropologist of Tibetan origin, who was born in Nepal and grew up in Kathmandu and Sindhupalchowk, is also the founder of the Mountain Resilien­cy Project which is working with commu­nities in the rugged high mountains to build climate change resilience. Dolma was recently listed in the ‘Forbes 30 under 30: Social Entrepre­neurs’, an achievement which is the first for a person from this region.

The Annapurna Express man­aged to briefly talk to Dolma who is currently based in Kathmandu. Excerpts from the rendezvous:

The beginning

My work on in remote mountains of Nepal started when I was 16 and study­ing in the US. From early childhood, my religion, culture and family always taught me that whatever you gain in life, you share with others. Because of these values, I felt it unfair to see how my childhood friends were living and how their lives were so different from mine, just because of the resources
avail­able to us. Therefore, when my college provided resources for me to do summer projects, I chose to come back to Nepal do small agricultural projects in remote areas, like Mustang. This is how the concept for the Mountain Resiliency Project was developed.

Managing resources

After my first trip to Nepal’s mountain­ous regions, I started sharing everything I had seen with the people in the US. I started doing presentations and talking about food and water insecurities, climate change and identity politics. By sharing my ideas with people, I found donors and foundations who supported us.

Areas of work

The Mountain Resiliency Project is cur­rently active in Mustang, Baglung, Sind­hupalchowk, Gorkha, Rasuwa, Manang, Dolpa and Solukhumbu. We focus on developing the agriculture sector there. We work with local communities and farmers to connect them to value added market chains, to make farm­ing more lucrative for remote areas.

Changes

In roughly nine years, we have managed to create a network of 15,000 farmers. In this time the average income of the farmers has increased by 800 percent. This has improved their standard of living and the children now have better access to education and health care. In our calculation, we have managed to generate a net benefit of $25 million in past nine years.

Challenges faced

As a young woman, whenever I go to district offices here in Nepal, I can never go forward and say I am the founder or CEO of an organization. I have to hide behind another man and pretend he is running the show. The problem of age and gender discrimination still exists in Nepal. There is also a gap between different ethnicities. The people of Tibet­an-Buddhist origins are still treated with a certain amount of foreignness despite us co-existing with our neighbors here for generations. There is a lot of identity politics in Nepal.

The future

We are planning to reach a million farmers in the next three years. We would also like to scale up to 12 more districts in Nepal and expand to northern India, if possible. Also, we want to turn the net benefit of $25 million into $250 million within the next 10 years for the benefit of the communities we are working with.

Recognition

I would never feel comfortable intro­ducing myself as a ‘Forbes 30 under 30’ person. In the past three or four years that I have been living in Nepal full time, I have spent 90 percent of my time up in the mountains instead of Kathmandu. It was never a priority for me to develop a network in Kathmandu. For me, being a part of the communi­ty, being there out on the ground, is so much more important than networking. All the awards, fellowships and recog­nitions I have received are based on the evaluation of my work.

Forbes 30 under 30

It has been such a blessing and priv­ilege to be a part of this cohort. I have spent time with the other 29 participants and each of them has been equally inspir­ing. I think to be the first Nepali-Tibetan person to be on that prestigious list is inspiring to the other people in our community as well. To see someone just like you who comes from the same background reach this posi­tion based on her own hard work is relatable to the youth here.

Message

I truly believe that what I am today is because of the people I met in the past and the lessons I learnt from them. I believe in sharing my knowl­edge and experience with everyone, especially other young women. My message to the youth and people who want to work in this field is— always say yes to everything. You get so many opportunities in life but you can grab them only if you put yourself out there. Also, seek mentors. Getting training and guidance at an early age is very important.