January 4, 2021

The 11^th CREEW Research Grant Program (CREEW-RGP) has been successfully held on 3 Jan 2021. Of the ten grantees, seven presented their final-term research virtually on zoom platform, while three of them submitted their research report as they were unable to present virtually.

The research topics of the grantees were: arsenic in groundwater and its health effect in terai; land subsidence in Kathmandu valley due to groundwater extraction; analysis of dyeing effluents laden river water; hydrogeo-chemical characteristic of groundwater; assessment of hydropower potential using SWAT modeling and spatial technology; life cycle assessment of municipal solid waste management; pollutant removal efficiencies of wastewater treatment plant; Kabache GLOF hazard in Madi River basin; pesticide residue in vegetable grown and consumed in Kathmandu valley and; from flow to footprint: an e-flow assessment using drift method.

Professors, experts and professionals affiliated to universities, research institutes and CREEW Executive Committee of various field of research provided feedback to the grantees presentation making the session interactive.

Dr. Anish Ghimire, Asst. Prof. from Kathmandu University said that the research grant program is great opportunity for the students and showed concern that due to the coronavirus pandemic field research was affected. Mr. Ram Charitra Sah from Khwopa College/Tribhuvan University highlighted need of research and development organizations like CREEW coming forward and taking quality research findings to the concern government agency for utilizing them for the policy and management interventions. Both the supervisors expressed the need of increasing the grant amount based on research requirement. Dr. Sangam Shrestha, Prof. from Asian Institute of Technology (AIT) Thailand and CREEW Research Grant Advisor suggested the grantees to participate and share the research output to workshops and conferences and, also prepare papers and for submission to peer-reviewed journals and other publications.

The program was attended by 20 participants. CREEW-RGP is financially supported by Kurita Environment Foundation (KWEF) Japan since 2008 to date to promote and support water and environment research and development in Nepal.