The Green Village Ventures program has since broadened its mission to promote sustainability practices across all the dimensions of a rural community. This new mission for Green Village Ventures creates innovative integrated development solutions which focus on the specific abilities and requirements of individual communities. By focusing community development efforts on integrating sustainable practices into existing community livelihoods, Green Ventures is able to form superior relationships with rural communities. These relationships are sustained overtime through Green Village Ventures transparent, participatory, monitoring and reporting methodology and facilitate the advancement of Green Ventures regional hydropower development.

Green Village Ventures’ projects within rural communities of Nepal and India strive to achieve the highest level of sustainable rural community growth over the long term. This can only be achieved through the establishment of an integrated approach to community development that can increase sustainable consumption and production patterns, increase employment and trade, improve the local quality of life through increased health standards and facilities, increase human capital development through education and job training program, and promote improved local governance and sustainable land-use management practices of threatened ecosystems and natural resources. Many of Green Village Ventures’ projects such as the installation of improved cooking stoves, biogas digesters, renewable energy generation units, agroforestry, avoided deforestation, afforestation, and reforestation, also continue to generate financially attractive returns through the sale of greenhouse-gas emission credits over a project’s lifetime. Green Village Ventures robust due diligence process evaluates the underlying social, cultural, political, economic, and environmental drivers, in order to ensure project success and achieve the highest level of sustainable commercial viability.
Project implementation is guided by Green Village Ventures Sustainability Principles which has been created by analyzing the most effective rural community development initiatives and adopting them to the specific issues which rural communities face in Nepal and India.
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Green Village Ventures rural community development projects are guided by Green Village Ventures Sustainability Principles. These principles and Green Ventures Project Reporting Methodology are adopted from and in acknowledgement of the finest efforts of organizations such as the United Nations and the Instituto Ecológica who spent decades redefining the possibilities for sustainable rural community development.
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Focus on the abilities and needs of the community.
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Utilize human capital and natural resources sustainably
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Participatory, holistic, dynamic, and flexible project implementation
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Design projects for problem solving and developing sustainability
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Address both local and global issues.
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Strive for social inclusion and recognizes gender issues and the forms of social difference
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Evaluate and mitigate risks to project sustainable commercial viability
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Analyze local ecosystems and their natural resource potential.
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Take into account existing power relations and the political context
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Green Village Ventures uses its Sustainability Principles as a guide for designing projects which enhance the existing capacities and capabilities of communities and address existing community needs. A rigorous assessment of the community is undertaken before any Green Village Venture projects are implemented to understand the complex social, political, cultural, economic, and environmental relationships and interactions which sustain the community. These assessments are conducted through a transparent and community participatory sustainability assessment methodology which Green Village Ventures uses to both assess the current sustainability baseline of a community and monitor and report the affects of Green Village Venture programs on community sustainability.
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Green Village Ventures measures rural community sustainability in Nepal by first defining and analyzing a community’s assets or resources which can be used to provide livelihoods such as soil composition, water supply, forests, biodiversity, skills, knowledge, work capability, health, social networks, savings, access to capital, livestock, land, and carbon management practices. These community assets are then classified into five categories, Natural Resources, Human Capital, Social Capital, Economic Resources, and Greenhouse-Gas Resources.
Natural Resources |
Natural Resources stocks (soil, water, air, etc.) and the environmental services they provide (soil retention, improved water access, pollination, biodiversity etc.) |
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| Human Capital |
Human capital, education, individual skills, capabilities, and health |
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| Social Capital |
Social networks, community relationships, community affiliations, community development programs |
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Economic Resources |
Access to capital, cash, microfinance, savings, and other assets. |
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Greenhouse – Gas Resources |
Carbon Management practiced, Carbon sequestration, substitution, and/or conservation. |
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Green Village Ventures assess the pre-existing state of each of these community assets or resources at a baseline condition before any projects are implemented. This assessment is initiated by a multidisciplinary team which undertakes research, field surveys and community interviews to determine the asset and resource baseline of a community. An in-depth report is then written to define the community’s sustainability baseline and to recommend projects for implementation. The quantitative and qualitative assessment is then converted into a transparent sustainability measurement system to simplify communication of Green Village Ventures assessment of the community’s overall sustainability. This initial process of baseline reporting is reapplied on a biannual basis to ensure active project monitoring and transparent sustainability reporting.
Green Village Ventures ranks each community asset on a scale of 1 – 6 which is presented on a graph to depict the degree of each asset’s sustainability. Each point on the pentagon represents the highest level of sustainability.

After conducting a baseline assessment and determining project(s) design and implementation strategy with the community Green Village Ventures executes the selected project(s). Green Village Ventures’ evaluation methodology is reapplied on a biannual basis after project implementation to monitor and report on the project’s success or failures. The impact of the project is communicated through a detailed project report and transparent sustainability measurement system. |