Seventeen activities that serve as shining examples of the enormous groundswell of action underway across the globe to address climate change were honoured yesterday at an Oscar-like ceremony at the United Nations climate change conference in Warsaw, Poland.
A women-centred initiative in Bangladesh, managed by the ActionAid, is among the 17 projects of the 2013 Lighthouse Activities.
Under the project, improved cooking-stoves were installed in 110 households, 10 temporary dams were built to preserve fresh water for irrigation and reduce salinity in the land, and a raised cluster village was created for landless families in flood-prone areas.
Funded by the Embassy of Denmark, the project areas include six upazilas in Faridpur, Sirajganj, Patuakhali, Naogaon districts.
The activity uses a model that focuses on building partnerships between national research and civil society organisations.
These groups can then share lessons learned and good practices, which can then be replicated and disseminated, increasing impact. Because this approach is flexible it can be adapted to the needs of local communities.
To help celebrate and recognise the achievements, attendees at the gala event were treated to inspiring speeches, powerful photos, inspirational videos and a rousing musical performance by Rocky Dawuni, Goodwill Ambassador for the Global Alliance of Clean Cookstoves.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and UNFCCC Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres were among the guests. Farah Kabir, country director of ActionAid Bangladesh, received the award on behalf of the organisation.
The UN chief said: “These initiatives are delivering profound economic, social and environmental benefits and demonstrating the power of innovative finance and the potential for long-term transformational change by women and urban poor. They deserve to be scaled-up and replicated."
The awards were declared on November 6.
The projects were picked up from among 252 applications as 2013 Lighthouse Activities under the Momentum for Change initiative of the UN Climate Change secretariat. The initiative is funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and The Rockefeller Foundation, and operates in partnership with the World Economic Forum.