Since 2023, Pipal Tree has been working alongside its south Nepal NGO partner the Mithila Wildlife Trust (MWT) to restore an important wildlife corridor in Dhanusha District. The corridor is sited along a traditional migratory route for wildlife that runs for 12-km from the wooded Chure Hills in mid-Nepal to the Dhanushadham Protected Forest, following the course of the Baluwa River. Over the years has become denuded from deforestation and animals now have to cross open farmland.

We have been changing that by conventional reforestation alongside use of the rapid-growth ‘Miyawaki Method’. The latter has been used to create a series of stepping-stone plantations for the final two kilometres of the southern end of the corridor. These have been characterised as ‘Gurkha Memorial Forests’ (GMFs) in honour of 13 Gurkha officers and soldiers who became national heroes by winning the Victoria Cross (the British Army’s highest award for gallantry) since the Second World War.

In the film below, Dev Narayan Mandal, Founder of MWT, revisits the fourth of these forests – GMF-4 – to tell us about the progress that has been made in restoring biodiversity – and doing so quickly!