country: Asia
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Kamala Bhattarai’s race against time
One morning, I went to my poultry farm to see the chickens and I was shocked seeing almost 700 chickens lying dead. I was speechless. I don’t know how I came back home. My daughter tried to talk to me but I was unconscious and could not respond to her. When I regained consciousness,…
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Jane Anyango Kola’s post-coronavirus hopes for her community
I believe that this crisis could be an opportunity to promote clean and modern energy services in rural areas. This would also help my business grow, while improving health and education in my community. Jane Anyango Kola lives in Homabay Town, on the shores of Lake Victoria in Western Kenya. She has been…
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Sanu Maya Shrestha’s journey towards self-independence
Sanu Maya Shrestha, age 33, residing in the rural municipality of Konjyosom, Nepal, is a successful entrepreneur engaged in multiple enterprises with the support of her husband Surya Narayan Shrestha. Prior to building their business, they were engaged in family agriculture and vegetable farming, which was not sufficient to meet the increasing expenses of the…
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Meena Basnet: “Supporting women entrepreneurs is what drives me”
By Gyanu Bist Meena Basnet has dedicated herself to supporting women entrepreneurs for 12 years. She has always been interested in social services. Encouraging startups and pushing existing entrepreneurs is her passion. “Mentoring helps women with decision-making, especially in rural areas. It reduces their feeling of isolation and improves their satisfaction. The handholding provided to…
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“It takes time to become successful but if you try, you definitely will one day”
Chini Maya Negi from Manikhel, Mahankal Rural Municipality, Lalitpur District is 45 years old and used to be a dedicated housewife. She struggled through the worst economic state of her family, caring for a paralyzed brother in law and a husband doing nothing. The family was facing difficulty in running the day to day…
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Ramila Rai: A successful journey towards self-empowerment in the agriculture sector
The journey out of poverty and towards equality is a though one in Nepal. The patriarchal society hinders women in taking stand-alone decisions and in pursuing income-generating opportunities. Although many gender norms and relations still need to be broken, positive signals are coming up with regards to women’s economic empowerment. Compared to a few years…
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Purnima Ghalan: From a small shop to a hotel business in Nepal
Living in Dalchoki, in Nepal, is already a challenge, but the barriers an entrepreneur like Purnima Ghalan faces go beyond the inaccessibility of this small nepali village. Due to cultural norms and gender roles, women in Nepal are often left behind in launching and growing small-scale businesses. Purnima, 40, is now a hotel owner…
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Shanti Thokar: How her business has changed her role within the family and community
When she started her business, Shanti Thokar was not aware of the incredible goals she could have reached. As her peers, she married at 18 years and dropped out of school to devote her time to her family. Shanti was engaged in her husband’s grocery store and over the years she became familiar with…
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Centre for Rural Technology, Nepal (CRT/N) awarded with HONORARY PRIZE by “Adaptation at Scale Prize Project”
Centre for Rural Technology, Nepal (CRT/N) has been awarded with “The Adaptation at Scale Prize” on 23rd May 2019 in recognition for the promotion of innovative and unique Hydraulic Ram Pump technology to improve the capacity of Nepal’s vulnerable communities to adapt climate change impacts. Mr Ganesh Ram Shrestha, Executive Director of CRT/N received…
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Gender in the transition to sustainable energy for all: From evidence to inclusive policies
The five-year research programme on gender and energy (2014-2019), coordinated by ENERGIA, was supported by the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID) as part of its Sustainable Energy, Access and Gender (SEAG) programme. The objective of the programme was to generate and analyse empirical evidence of the links between gender, energy and poverty, and to…
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Supporting last-mile women energy entrepreneurs: What works and what does not
ENERGIA has been working on the intersection of energy access and women’s economic empowerment through its Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) programme. This document presents ENERGIA’s four-year journey to create and upscale women-centric energy enterprises that sell safe, reliable and affordable energy solutions to low-income consumers in underserved areas. It is a self-reflection, undertaken collectively by…
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Unlocking the Benefits of Productive Uses of Energy for Women in Ghana, Tanzania and Myanmar
This research report provides empirical evidence from three case studies in Tanzania, Ghana and Myanmar to address the existing literature gap on gender and PUE. The focus is on electricity, because our target regions benefited from interventions to provide access to electricity, and in some cases to promote productive uses and gender mainstreaming. However, our…