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Norway aid for food security in India.
Oct 31, 2023

Norway will help fund India’s ‘Hunger Project’ and help strengthen women leaders to protect the environment and promote food security in Uttarakhand.

The duration of the project would be three years, until September 2026 with a budget of Rs.44.7 million, an official said.

The hunger project organizes capacity-building training for elected women representatives (EWRs) and federations, focusing on strengthening van panchayats (forest councils) which in turn will ensure food security and livelihood opportunities for marginalized households.

The programme will strengthen elected women’s leadership in gram panchayats so that they can play a pivotal role in conserving forests and natural resources, devise and adopt strategies to promote sustainable living, food security and collaborate with members of van panchayats and the local community, especially women.

The project will be implemented in 3 districts, 9 blocks, 172 gram panchayats and 145 van panchayats of Uttarakhand involving 900 EWRs for the protection of standing forests and nurturing their immediate environment that is crucial to the community’s livelihoods and food security.

Additionally, it will enhance awareness of local communities via 334 Jagrukh Manchs to effectively combat climate change risks collectively, the official informed.

The expected outcome of the project includes capacity building of elected women representatives (EWRs) and federations, an advanced environment, friendly development agendas in Panchayats, strengthening institutional processes to manage and conserve forest commons, mitigate climate risks, ensuring food security and livelihood opportunities for marginalised households, the official added.

Queries sent to spokespeople of the Norwegian Embassy in New Delhi and Indian ministries of finance, food & public distribution and climate change remained unanswered at press time.

The inter-governmental Panel Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report (2007) suggests that the Himalayan Eco-system is particularly at risk of a rise in global temperatures and one of the states in India that is most at risk is Uttarakhand, which is one of the most ecologically sensitive, fragile and climatically vulnerable states of the country. Over 70% of its geographical area is under forests and predominantly rural and dependent on natural ecosystems for their livelihoods and sustenance. Availability and access to clean water sources is a challenge with many natural springs drying up. Citizens in the project intervention area, especially the poor have experienced the impact of natural disasters and environmental degradation, but their knowledge and awareness of long-term impact is low. Most importantly, for women living in these areas in particular, the impact of climate change means more hardship. In the villages, women are also responsible for fetching safe drinking water, collecting fodder for animals and managing other natural resources.

The Hunger Project will leverage the Uttarakhand government’s priority of making sustainable development an important element in the state’s growth strategy. Furthermore, the overall objective and interventions will consider the climate and environment policy priorities and commitments of the Indian government. Adaptation to climate risks will be focused upon, aligned with the Indian government’s stand for COP28. With India assuming G20 presidency in 2023 the five priority areas of work identified by the group- two areas include women leadership at the grassroots and women and girls as change makers for climate resilient action are in sync with the overall proposed program objective and priorities. Interventions will focus on mitigating the impact of climate change on food security mainly addressing eroded livelihood opportunities, nutrition security and adverse health impacts

Similarly, the Government of Norway’s priority themes of gender, environment, climate change, conservation of forests and food security will be advanced in three years during the project.

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