Mercy Corps will become Prosper Global

Home Grown School Feeding (HGSF)

World Food Program (WFP) Nepal as a lead/prime organization in partnership with Mercy Corps and other partners is implementing a four-year School Feeding Program funded by USDA McGovern Dole Food for Education Programme (FFEP). Under the FFEP, Mercy Corps provides strategic leadership for program’s two of the sub-activities ‘Local Purchase of Food: Hybrid Food Basket’ and ‘Home Grown School Feeding: Technical Assistance Post-Hand Over’. The aim of the Mercy Corps’ interventions is to facilitate the development of a fully sustainable and locally managed food system for schools. This includes designing and implementing the strategy and detailed roadmap for schools to self-manage a cash-based program where they locally procure and manage relationships and contracts with local producers, cooperatives and suppliers to supply the appropriate and necessary school meal food items during relevant timeframes. The program activities links school feeding programs to smallholder farmers, farmer’s cooperatives, school management, community groups and local government to enhance the program’s long-term sustainability. The target area of the program covers five districts in the Sudurpachhim Province (Darchula, Bajhang, Doti, Achham, and Bajura) and one district in the Karnali Province (Jajarkot).

Sankalpa: Restoring Hope

संकल्प: Restoring Hope, is a post-earthquake recovery project in the affected areas of Jajarkot and West Rukum, focusing on restoring damaged water and sanitation facilities and promoting improved hygiene practices through social behavior change communication. The project uses the Cash and Voucher Assistance (CVA) approach, which is central to its mission of addressing multiple needs and enhancing household-level food security for the most vulnerable households. Water and sanitation facilities will be restored through the CVA hybrid modalities approach utilizing multipurpose cash assistance, electronic vouchers, and cash-for-work. This will demonstrate a sectoral approach to CVA that meets WASH outcomes.

BHAKARI

BHAKARI supported communities, households, and individuals in their journey to self-reliance while reducing the overall humanitarian caseload of the Karnali River Basin area.

Mercy Corps Nepal managed the BHAKARI program, supported by USAID’s Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance (BHA). BHAKARI was a unique model as a Multi-Year Emergency program, focusing on both increasing long-term food security while also responding to short-term emergency shocks, via an integrated, multi-sectoral approach with a strong emphasis on gender and social inclusion. Key sectors include disaster risk reduction, integrated agriculture, watershed management, and emergency assistance, and was implemented in partnership with six district-level implementing partners, three national-level technical partners, and one international social enterprise partner, taking careful advantage to leverage work with other USAID implementers, donor programs, and key initiatives from the Government of Nepal.

PAHAL

PAHAL stands for Promoting Agriculture, Health and Alternative Livelihoods. It is a five-year USAID initiative designed to achieve food security among vulnerable populations in 14 districts in the middle and high hills of Mid and Far Western Nepal. PAHAL is a Food for Peace (FFP) Development Food Assistance Project (DFAP) within the USAID/Nepal’s Community Resilience Program. Resilience is defined as the capacity of communities in complex socio-ecological systems to learn, cope, adapt and transform in the face of shocks and stresses.

RESILIENCE PLUS

Resilience Plus was a programme funded via the UK Government’s Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) Nepal Emergency Response Framework (NERF) to ensure that COVID-19-related resilience of vulnerable households is strengthened and maintained into the monsoon season through coordinated cash and voucher assistance with integrated access to improved nutrition and protection services and linkages to safety nets.

Programme activities were undertaken by 7 consortium members, including 2 International NGOs, Mercy Corps (Consortium leader) and Plan International, and 5 district-based partner NGOs, namely Banke UNESCO Club, Rural Society Development Centre, Rural Development Centre Nepal, NEEDS Nepal, and Mandwi. The programme worked in partnership with 171 local merchants as well as a financial service provider (FSP), Prabhu Bank. The programme covered 6 districts (Sunsari, Dhanusha, Rautahat, Bardiya, Kailali and Kanchanpur) and local partners coordinated programme activities with palika and ward level officials, in collaboration with the protection committees in each of the 14 palikas.

STEM II

Supporting the Education of Marginalized Girls in Kailali (STEM II) is a DFID funded program focused on marginalized girls in Kailali district. The project aims to improve the life changes of marginalized girls in Kailali through a series of proven interventions centred on the Theory of Change (ToC). Programme activities include: campaigning to promote girls’ education; training school teachers, school management personnel and parents; upgrading school infrastructure; offering vocational training and business start-up loans; delivering critical academic support through after school classes in English, Maths, Science and project tailored life skills and sexual and reproductive health to girls; and providing financial literacy, vocational training and employment opportunities to help girls transition from school into employment. In addition to marginalized girls, STEM will work with boys, teachers, SMC and PTA members, parents and community members to ensure that girls have an enabling and supportive environment and that increased access to economic opportunities coupled with learning will lead to economic empowerment for girls.