Home Gardens in Nepal

ANNEX- A

SUMMARY OF THE MEETING

Two days sharing and planning workshop on “Enhancing the contribution of home gardens
to on-farm management of plant genetic resources and to improve the livelihoods of
Nepalese farmers” was held on 6-7 August, 2004 in Pokhara. The objectives of the
workshop were:

• To advance understanding of the complex process and mechanisms for on-farm
  management of crop diversity and their relation with farmers' livelihoods in home
  garden ecosystems;


• To sensitize research, academic and development institutions on the value of home
  gardens for social, economic and environmental benefits to the community;


• To compare and exchange experiences in encouraging management practices and
  systems of home gardens for dietary diversity, on-farm management and sustainable
  livelihoods;


• To identify lessons learnt for policy and capacity building, and


• To share the progresses of annual activity and plan priority activities for next year
  (Sep 04 – Aug 05)

The forum helped in identifying issues of research and development interest in home
gardens to maximize its important. The meeting also served as a venue to share the
experiences of different stakeholders and attempts were made to incorporate the prioritized
issue in the project planning and also to link with the programme of relevant stakeholders.
The experiences of stakeholders were particularly discussed on following themes.

1. Home gardens as a source of dietary diversity
   
   
   • Ways to enhance roles of home gardens role in dietary diversity
   
   
   • Current status (gaps and strategies to link home gardens with nutrition)
   
   
   • Awareness on nutritional values of home garden species
   
   
   
   


2. Home gardens’ role in on-farm diversity management
   
   
   • Current status of biodiversity in home gardens (extent, gaps, issues etc.)
   
   
   • How the diversity is being managed? (Types, composition, structure etc.)
   
   
   • Methodologies used in identifying the diversity in home gardens
   
   
   
   


3. Home gardens’ contribution to livelihoods
   
   
   • Home gardens in food security
   
   
   • Home gardens and income generation
   
   
   • Home gardens in meeting socio-cultural requirements
   
   
   
   


4. Determinants of home garden diversity
   
   
   • Socio-economic factors (food culture, local knowledge, gender, ethnicity, market
     etc)
   
   
   • Ecological factors
   
   
   • Farmers awareness on value of home gardens
   
   
   
   


5. Good practices and lessons learned from community biodiversity management approach

• Social, economic and environmental benefits


• local governance


• social inclusion and peace-building


• scaling up and out mechanisms