Researcher Centre for Women's Awareness and Development (CWAD)
The Centre for Women’s Awareness and Development (CWAD), the Lead Learning Partner in Nepal, conducted a mixed methods evaluation to understand the diverse needs of women and girls during humanitarian crises and women’s capacity to participate in humanitarian decision-making. The study including Focus Groups with 15 Women-Led Organizations (WLOs) WLOs in 3 different provinces (Sudurpaschim Lumbini, and Bagmati), comprising 225 women; 45 Key Informant Interviews with local elected officials and community leaders; and additional qualitative field observations and document reviews.
The results show that most of the WLOs lack access to resources to engage in humanitarian settings. About one third of the WLOs who participated in this study are informal advocacy networks and are diverse in terms of caste, ethnicity, religion, age, indigenous status, and other categories of disadvantage.
The qualitative nature of this study led to some unanticipated findings that will inform future program implementation. For example, the tradition of dowry is a customary practice and deeply rooted in Kanchanpur, Kailali, Dang, Kapilvastu, and Rupandehi districts. We found that the dowry amount was proportional to the age of the girl. In other words, the younger the girl, the lower the dowry amount, and as her age increases so does the dowry amount. This is a leading factor of early marriage as parents cannot afford a more expensive dowry. These kinds of rich contextual details will be used to ensure project activities are aligned to program goals, and would not have emerged without a feminist, participatory evaluation framework.
