Dedicated Academic Mentor and Research Lead with over eight years of experience driving doctoral-level scholarship in agricultural mechanization, farming systems, and climate-smart practices across Nepal.
Key Research Projects Supervised:
Assessment of the monitoring and evaluation (M&E) system of the Benazir Income Support Program (BISP) for preparing the Integrated Social Protection Development Program (ISPDP) for a loan assistance of the Asian Development Bank. Tasks accomplished included description and analysis of four M&E systems operating within BISP and recommendation for an integrated M&E system within the BISP. Activities included document review, virtual interview with stakeholders, virtual interaction with ADB team, guidance for local consultants and preparation of reports. ADB-fund.
Population Based Survey of Feed the Future programme in Nepal. Feed the Future, led by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), seeks to reduce poverty and undernutrition through its focus on accelerating growth of the agriculture sector, addressing root causes of undernutrition, improving health and reducing gender inequality. Specific tasks include: Document review; Scoping activity planning (Arranging scoping trip meetings and coordinating with local stakeholders; Providing inputs to Scoping Trip SOW; Providing outputs regarding scoping trip for summary report); Survey preparation (Preparing the study design and survey protocol; Updating Feed the Future survey instruments; Pre-testing and drafting report to pretesting field wok); Training material development (Agriculture-specific training materials; General requests, team calls, commenting on deliverables, facilitating IRB requests); Planning of activities; Enumerators training, pretesting and piloting; Preparation, supervision, guidance and overall responsibility for the production of all deliverables. USAID-fund.
Strategic review of the food security and nutrition programme in Nepal for the government of Nepal with support from the World Food Programme. The overall objective of the strategic review is to enable Nepal to accelerate progress towards eliminating food insecurity and malnutrition in line with Sustainable Development Goal (SDG)-2 to “end hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promotion of sustainable agriculture. My major tasks: Take the lead role of the assignment; coordinate with all 8 sector experts (agriculture, economics and finance, supply systems, environment, gender, social protection, nutrition, and food system), in the team; take the lead role during advisory committee meetings led by the National Planning Commission of Nepal and other required meetings; prepare and present inception report; guide the thematic consultants to receive the required information in the thematic report; compile the thematic reports from consultants; prepare the preliminary report; participate in the sharing of the preliminary report and prepare draft report; take the lead role in finalizing the report and successfully completing the task; and lead the final high level launching of the report. The report analysed the policies, approaches, strategies, programmes, projects, institutions, targets and indicators of SDG2. It extensively reviewed the country’s Constitution, the Zero Hunger Challenge (ZHC), the Agriculture Development Strategy (ADS), the Food and Nutrition Security Plan of Action (FNSPA), the Multi-Sectoral Nutrition Plan (MSNP), the 14th Plan, and the recently approved “Gender Equality and Social Inclusion (GESI) mainstreaming strategy” developed by the then Ministry of Agriculture Development (MoAD) and social protection. It also assessed the challenges that included local governments’ commitment to food security and nutrition, increased feminization, climate change, inadequate infrastructure including irrigation and transport including market road, timely availability of key inputs, and elite capture of subsidies and grants. Assessment also included interconnectivity of SDGs including zero poverty, gender equality, water, sanitation and health, social inclusion, reducing inequality, and provided country strategies and pathways to achieve 2030 targets of SDG2 that no one is left behind by attaining the benefits of programmes related food security and nutrition paying special attention to vulnerable and disadvantaged groups including the poor, ethnic minorities, women, girls, children, disabled, pregnant and lactating mothers. It also developed strategies to achieve SDG2 targets by 2030 while proposing multi-sectoral governance mechanism at federal, provincial, and local level. WFP-fund.
Study on enhancing Demand for and Use of Evaluation in Development through Management Response to Evaluation (MRE): Experiences and Learning from South Asia. The project intends to (i) assess the status of MRE use in Bangladesh, Bhutan, and Nepal, (ii) developed MRE index to monitor the status of the demand for and use of evaluation in development. Three country reports are prepared based on quantitative and qualitative data collected from government, INGO/NGOs, UN agencies and donors. Developed proposal, provided orientation to country teams, supervise implementation and preparation of consolidated report.
Preparation of participatory monitoring and evaluation guidelines. It has three major tasks: Situation Analysis of PM&E, Develop PM&E guidelines, and Develop action plan for implementation of PM&E guidelines. Methodology included: Stock taking of PM&E tools and practices in Nepal; Key informant interview regarding PM&E tools and practices; Three consultations on PM&E tools and practices; Analysis and documentation of PM&E tools; Develop common PM&E framework/principles and tools; Consultation on draft PPM&E framework/principles and tools; Finalize PPM&E framework/principles and tools; and Suggesting action plan for implementation of PM&E guidelines.
Study on Regulatory Framework Promotion of Pro-poor Insurance Markets in Asia. Task included: demand-side study with agricultural representatives and focus group discussion with farmers; conducted pilot workshop with selected farmers. Tasks also included contribution to the quality control of the following deliverables: The country diagnostic on agricultural insurance in Nepal; The case study on agricultural insurance in Nepal; The risk manuals for farmers.
Identification of areas of Project for Agriculture Commercialization and Trade (PACT) assistance to regional directorates and district agriculture development offices (DADOs) and the District Livestock Service Offices (DLSOs) of the Ministry of Agriculture Development in order to enhance their capacities to participate in and support PACT’s activities, particularly on agriculture, rural business development and climate change components. Specifically, the study: (1) Assessed the current governance structure and capacity of the regional and district offices under the MoAD and their strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and challenges (SWOC) for effectively participating in PACT activities and enhance the impact of the PACT’s matching grant assistance; (2) Developed terms of reference and activities to be carried out by the proposed Project Implementation Support Team at the regional level in order that the linkages and collaborations between the PACT and region and district based MoAD offices could be further strengthened; and (3) Suggested mechanisms to PACT’s assistance to aforementioned agencies based on performance based modality/approach. WB fund.
National Evaluation Capacity Development. Provided an independent, comprehensive overview and in-depth analysis of the (1) Enabling environment (Legislation, policies, procedures & guidelines, institutional environment, and implementation, etc.; (2) Assessed areas of evaluation capacity needs: (a) among evaluators / firms/civil societies/associations and networks; (b) among academic / capacity building institutions in Nepal; and (3) Identified potential models for strengthening evaluation capacity in South Asian region and provide a comparative analysis of Nepal and models used in other South Asian countries for evaluation capacity development. UNDP fund.
Baseline survey of the Project for Agricultural Commercialisation and Trade. This is a large sample survey conducted in 25 project districts including those affected by a decade old conflict with equal number of participants and non-participants randomly selected 3300 households. Activities included designing survey, instruments, field testing, and preparing final survey instrument; monitoring of field activities; ensuring record keeping of the contact to be used for mid-term, final and impact evaluation as suggested by the World Bank; preparing and presenting inception report; recruiting and conducting orientation to enumerators, supervisors and other consultants from different disciplines; writing report and presentation. Assessment included the capacity and approach taken by partner civil society organisations (NGOs, Cooperatives, Farmers’ groups) and private entrepreneurs in the area of commericialization of agriculture including livestock, horticulture, cereal and medicinal crops. WB fund.
Baseline survey for Hadia Agriculture no Nutrisaun (HAN) – Improving Agriculture and Nutrition. Tasks: Assisted develop baseline survey design and methodology including sampling regime, questionnaire,trained enumerators, oversaw survey implementation, and data analysis, and carried out report preparation and submission. EC fund.
Study on civil society mapping in Asia. The tasks included overview of the modalities of civil society inclusion in EC development cooperation, and of the civil society mapping studies already conducted by the EC and/or other donors and institutions, in the mentioned countries; undertaking a pilot civil society mapping study in Nepal. The study assessed the strengths, weaknesses and enabling environment of registered civil society organizations including NGOs and their networks as well as unregistered groups of civil societies who get united under certain common issues and exert pressure. EC fund.
Preparation of a document of synopsis of cases of Decentralized Local Governance Support Programme (DLGSP/UNDP) of the Ministry of Local Development in the areas of social mobilization, capacity building of local bodies, support in policy formulation in local governance and poverty reduction. Identified strengths and weaknesses, identified success cases, made gap assessment, examined the public hearing and gender budget auditing system, and assessed the phase out strategy, alternative arrangement during conflict, community development fund, capacity building, partnership approach, social inclusion and gender equality, financial transparency and accountability in context of yearly auditing exercise, and effectiveness of quick impact and peace support initiatives designed for conflict period. Field visit included Morang, Sunsari, Bara, Parsa (Eastern and Central Tearai where conflict was still prevailing even after the comprehensive peace accord) and Dhading, Kaski (Western Hill) districts. UNDP-fund.
Institution analysis of Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives and its departments with special focus on policies, strategies and implementation plan for human resources development and governance. Special responsibility of analysing and restructuring of Cooperative Department and Cooperative Training Centres including their governance and monitoring and evaluation system. Activities included review of present status of cooperative department and its district offices, staff and finances, capacity gap identification and development of restructuring plan. DfID-fund.
Developed methodology, identified team members, orientation training for the team, supervised and monitored survey team, analyzed quantitative and qualitative data, presented findings, identified best practices and incorporated into strategic recommendations, wrote report of the Food Security and Hunger Survey in Nepal for Bread for the World, Germany and published the report.
Developed partnership and cost sharing model which has been accepted as the partnership model for agriculture sector for the 10th Five Year Plan (2002 – 2007) for livelihoods programmes
Reviewed livelihood approaches and provided strategies for designing a baseline study for Livelihoods and Forestry Project funded by DFID.
Analyzed vulnerability of major livelihoods in Nepal including traditional rural service providers, load carrying people, street children and farm and non-farm labourers for a Food Security Project and provided suggestions for improving livelihoods of vulnerable people.
Prepared study design, carried out and supervised survey, analysed data and wrote report about bonded labour in Nepal based on survey findings. Activities included identifying indicators for future monitoring and evaluation of rehabilitation programme for bonded and non-bonded labourers. In addition to the review of legislative and policy background, micro-and macro-environment, social dialogue, government practices, socio-economic background of the communities, and financial and economic environment, the factors and process that have influenced the implementation of a project on debt bondage including their children in the district were also examined. Field survey districts included Banke, Bardiya, Kailali (Western Terai) districts.
Conducted research on partnership between government, non-government and private organizations in extending agricultural technologies to farmers; served as a president of the association of fellows, scholars, trainees and residents of IRRI (AFSTRI) and coordinated with over 100 people of different national (over 25), educational, ethnic, cultural backgrounds; managed programmes and budget and represented AFSTRI to various forums.; and established networks with other organizations of CGIAR system.
Provided cooperative development training, workshops, seminars and conferences for executive, staff and members of cooperative movement in Nepal with special responsibilities for the planning, designing, implementation, coordination, monitoring, performance evaluation, sharing and administration of UNFPA-funded Population Education and Agricultural training. Other responsibilities included needs assessment, curriculum development, training materials preparation, facilitations, linkage establishment with international and national training centers, conduct of national workshops and seminars on cooperative movement and impact evaluation of two training programmes; arrangement for tripartite steering committee meetings; preparation of ToR for hiring resource persons; developing proposals for funding; and preparation of technical, semi-annual, annual and project completion reports.