LESSONS LERNT IN THE LAST TWO DECADES

• Jagaran Nepal has realized that the economic stability is the first door that enables women to take their journey towards political spheres. It believes that economic empowerment of women should go hand-in hand with the political empowerment. If the economic empowerment is not sufficient, problems will arise in women’s leadership and decision-making platforms. It is better realized that coordination with the multi-sector agencies like cooperatives, financial institutions, technical training institutions are crucial for providing capacity building activities, skills development training, income generating activities and livelihood support.
• Due to our working experience in different local government, we realized that an assumption persists that the engagement of men in skills trainings will help in reduce male control, and thereby discourages cultural barriers baring women from their political rights and meaningful participation. However, it is our realization that involving men in only limited activities is not enough. Rather we need to involve men in all the project cycle instead of one single-off events to encourage women’s participation.
• Consortium mechanism adopted by the project turned to be far more effective. In different project area, district-based partners are implementing district and community level activities. Since these partners belong to the same community where the project was being run, they were able to bring the real/genuine issues and try their best to address. This had a great impact and influence in the project areas which lead to the realization of concrete change at the end of the project.