Bishnudev Mahato was born into a poor family, in the Mahottari district of Nepal, inheriting only 0.43 hectares of land from which he needed to support his wives and children.

After decades of hard work, the family were finally able to feed themselves, and send the younger children to school. But this has all been threatened by the changing climate; when we met Bishnu, he was again struggling to make ends meet as his village was constantly hit by droughts and floods, and his crops often failed or were destroyed.

We have partnered with an organisation called Community Self-Reliance Centre (CSRC), to support Bishnu and his fellow villagers. CSRC supported the farmers to understand how the climate crisis is affecting them, and to reform their farming procedures. As a result, Bishnu has expanded his vegetable farming substantially, with a diverse range of crops that are more resistant to droughts, such as beans, cabbages, cauliflowers, chillies, bitter guard, and aubergine.

Bishnu says, “I am informed of climate-resilient tools and have a plan to use them on my farm. In addition, to make it more climate resilient I am planning to the latest reformed farming system.”