Kuensel Corporation Limited, Bhutan’s English national newspaper, recently completed their CEPF-funded project, “Advocacy and Awareness Campaign on Biodiversity in Bhutan.” According to Pushpa Chhetri, Project Director for this CEPF project, Kuensel’s goal for this project was to “Inform and educate the nation and/or targeted communities on biodiversity conservation and sustainable development issues in Bhutan.”
As the organization stated in its final project report to CEPF, it met all of its project objectives and successfully completed the project. Throughout the course of their project, the Kuensel project implementers learned some valuable lessons, which they shared with us.
In terms of the project’s outputs, the Kuensel staff reported to have gained experience in different fields including news reporting, advocacy and producing supplements related to conservation issues. They also attended a training on the Media’s role in environmental conservation, enhancing Kuensel’s capacity to develop an environment and/or conservation project in partnership with other organizations. Finally, through Kuensel’s efforts in knowledge distribution, an increased interaction among the stakeholders in the society helped to increase understanding of each one’s roles and responsibilities.
Pushpa Chhetri believes that “awareness and education are key to achieving conservation outcomes.” She also stated that local ownership of the projects is very important; and she also realized that in order to have sustained conservation activities, funding is required.
Chhetri revealed that “it was good to partner with Nature Conservation Division and RSPN for identification of project sites, but we should have selected fewer project sites for better penetration.” Kuensel Corporation Ltd. selected five project sites to which it distributed awareness and education related supplements. Additionally, “since Kuensel staff was responsible for the whole execution, it became very challenging especially as a daily newspaper to both publish the paper and run the project. An intern or a temporary staff could have been hired,” offered Chhetri.
Chhetri also reported that, “With the exposure and training that the Kuensel Staff received from this project, Kuensel now has better understanding and skills to conduct advocacy and awareness campaigns on biodiversity issues with or without the project. Kuensel’s coverage on environment will continue and with increased partnerships, it will be easier to get funding for the supplements and other activities.”
Finally, Chhetri assessed that “Overall, the project has had a very positive impact on Kuensel and the project staff. The whole process has been a chain of educational experience not only in terms of coverage of biodiversity conservation but also in building capacity, understanding the values and media’s role attached to it.”