Environmental research

The dilemma of typical lowland villages in Nepal is lack of nearby forest land. Most of the lowland Terai, which once used to be a dense forest, is now turned to agriculture field. In the typical Jabdi and Bhaktipur VDC of Sarlahi lowland, the villagers use agriculture waste and the cowdung to cook their food, which lead to the well known paradox- The Nepalese farmers cook their rice with rice and wheat with wheat. This paradox is true as the use of cowdung cake used in the field yields wheat and rice. On the other hand, national experience in individual biogas is very promising. But this is limited to middle class families, who own some land and a pair of cattle. Again most of the villagers hesitate to install biogas due to high initial investment. The project aimed to demonstrate use of biogas in community level, where even poor members can also share the facility of the biogas. The slurry thus produce would be used in agriculture to introduce permaculture in the village. The successful implementation of the project would result 4 community biogas plants of 50 cubic meter, 300 ICS with capacity building of the local community in slurry management and permaculture

Nepal