Project Partners and Collaborators: Southasia Institute of Advanced Studies (SIAS), The University of Edinburgh (UoE) and Herne Katha
Funded by: UKRI – Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC Impact Acceleration Grant)
Duration: August 2025 – December 2026
Project Description:
Nepal is experiencing profound socio-economic and environmental changes, triggered by the climate crisis, disaster risks, rural out-migration, human-wildlife conflict and food insecurity. Maintaining rural livelihoods and mountain landscapes that can cope with and be resilient in the face of these changes is a significant challenge. Care is central to addressing that challenge, given that care is “everything we do to maintain, continue, and repair our ‘world’ so that we can live in it as well as possible”. The role of care has however been ignored in resilience-related policies and projects, and the lived experiences of rural villagers have been overlooked, with techno-managerial responses dominating instead.
This project therefore aims to place the concept of “care” at the centre of resilience thinking and practice in Nepal. This project will engage professionals and practitioners working in resilience-related policies and projects at local and national levels in Nepal, to strengthen their capacity to understand the role of care in maintaining resilient livelihoods and landscapes, and to build their confidence in implementing this in their work.
The project will build on and amplify prior research work and community engagement through an action-oriented knowledge sharing approach. A film featuring rural communities and the landscapes they care for will be produced alongside accessible training and learning materials. These resources will be used to facilitate dialogue, reflection, and learning among policymakers and practitioners, creating space to connect community experiences with resilience policy and practices. Ultimately, the project aims to promote socially grounded, locally informed, and care-centred approaches to building resilient rural livelihoods and mountain landscapes in Nepal.
Project Lead from SIAS: Sanjaya Khatri
Team at SIAS: Dr Gyanu Maskey and Dr Govinda Paudel
Principal Investigator: Dr Sam Staddon, University of Edinburgh
Collaborators in Nepal: Team from Herne Katha