Lalitpur: UN-HABITAT, in collaboration with Lalitpur Metropolitan City and with funding support from Fukuoka Habitat Institute, has implemented “Promotion of Urban Agriculture through Rooftop Farming” program in ward no 15 of Lalitpur district. With technical support from HASERA Agriculture Research and Training Center and Story Cycle, the initiative aims to promote urban agriculture for ensuring access to healthy food and improving food security for vulnerable households in urban areas, integrated with raising awareness on regreening our cities, rainwater harvesting, and organic waste management at community level.
In a three-day training organized at Namuna Machindra Secondary School, Deputy Mayor of Lalitpur Metropolitan City Manjari Shakya Bajracharya unveiled the mobile application “Karesa” designed and built to provide technical support to individuals interested in urban agriculture. She also highlighted the importance of rooftop farming in household waste management, pollution control, and urban beautification.
Pragya Pradhan, Habitat Program Manager of UN HABITAT Nepal, said that the objective of the project is to reduce the unforeseen food crisis during disaster, to empower and strengthen household level sustainable waste management and to link urban farming and products from urban agriculture with market with technology. She highlighted the importance of awareness about the environmental issues at the school level, engaging with children and youth to preserve urban environment with the urban agriculture demo garden established at Namuna Machindra School’s rooftop to play a crucial role, in leadership of School Principal Radhakrishna Mahat. The school has also established Eco Club for the management of the rooftop garden.
The three days TOT organized at Namuna Machindra school from July 26-28 covered different aspects of urban farming such as women entrepreneurship, local practices in urban gardening, international status and practices of urban farming, urban hydroponics, use of light trap pheromone trap, pest management, different methods of urban composting, urban garden design and management, mixed farming, vertical farming among others.
Govinda Sharma, lead trainer with Bibek Dhital, Maheshwori Bista, Deepika Gyawali, Saurav Dhakal and Nischal Pokhrel, provided hands on training in the demo farm, which was participated by 47 urban farming enthusiasts from all wards of Lalitpur.
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