
He is a committed scientist and author who has worked intensively on the topics of sustainable development, climate change, culture and transformative education in the Himalayas. Together with colleagues from Austria and Italy, he founded EcoHimal, the Society for Alpine-Himalayan Cooperation, in 1992 and is its chairman. These NGO sister organisations - which also exist in South Tyrol, Italy, Germany, the UK and Nepal - aim to sustainably improve living conditions in the Himalayan region in close cooperation with local communities.
#schongenial: What inspired you to found EcoHimal and what particular challenges did you have to overcome in the early years of the organisation?
Kurt Luger : In 1983, when I was over 30 years old and already working as an assistant at the University of Salzburg, I completed my civilian service at the Austrian Information Service for Development Policy, now known as Südwind. This fuelled my interest in the Third World and my commitment to a fairer world. After completing my civilian service and the death of my father, I spent a few months in Nepal before returning to university. As an alpinist, the Himalayas - with a focus on Nepal and Tibet - had long been a destination of longing and I subsequently travelled there every year, meeting very interesting people, including leading journalists, scientists, architects and activists in the social and cultural sector. So I conquered the country for myself and stuck my nose in everywhere. I wrote articles about the country and its people, about development projects and, critically, about the power station in the clouds, which had been built at an altitude of 4,000 metres with Austrian funding. Little did I know that I would one day be responsible for it, because in 1992 I founded EcoHimal with a group of committed people.
EcoHimal started its work in the Himalayas with the small power plant near Namche Bazar in the Mount Everest/Sagarmatha National Park - in the shadow of the highest mountain in the world. We had the task of getting a turnkey power plant up and running, i.e. organising the training of the employees - all from the Sherpa ethnic group - writing a business plan and setting social electricity tariffs. In the end, we managed this very well, with a lot of dedication and plenty of expertise. We had tough discussions, which challenged many a friendship in our group, and never-ending negotiations with the local people. In 1995, the power plant was handed over to the operating company and with its participatory management - the Khumbu Bijuli Company essentially consists of the user groups of the three communities that are supplied with electricity from the power plant - it was highly praised by the National Planning Commission as a model example of decentralised and self-managed energy generation.
The Austrian Foreign Ministry was impressed that we had mastered the challenges so well and invited us to realise another project, one that we had on our list of priorities. So we started an agricultural and agroforestry development project in the Makalu-Barun National Park and its buffer zone, which was followed by others in other remote regions. Today, EcoHimal Nepal operates a network of 14 agroforestry resource and training centres across the country, managed by the National Agroforest Academy, which also runs a model farm on the terraces of a mountain ridge outside the Kathmandu Valley.
#schongenial: What are EcoHimal's key objectives in the Himalayan regions, and how has the organisation's structure and focus evolved since it was founded?
Kurt Luger : As a non-profit association and international non-governmental organisation, EcoHimal is based in Salzburg and works with local grassroots groups in the Hindu Kush-Himalayan region. EcoHimal's development projects are highly participatory and are primarily orientated towards the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations and the proven principles of international development cooperation.
The projects in Nepal are implemented by EcoHimal Nepal, an independent national sister NGO. We are implementing the projects in Kyrgyzstan with the national partner organisation Agents for Change and in Bhutan with the Tarayana Foundation. All previous projects - in Pakistan, for example, reconstruction after the major earthquake in 2005 and in Tibet, where we built several dozen small schools in the nomadic areas - were always implemented together with local organisations.
The projects are financed by foundations, state organisations, the European Union, business partners, sponsors and private donors.
EcoHimal's mission is to provide the people of the Himalayas with better living conditions in the long term and to support them in taking the development of their regions into their own hands. The fight against poverty and the protection of biodiversity in order to guarantee the long-term, sensible coexistence of people and nature - these are the major tasks of any development co-operation. All our projects pursue social, humanitarian, ecological, economic and cultural objectives in an integrative manner, which are realised together with the local people in regional development projects.
Our integrative project concept is focussed on
- Poverty reduction, income generation and appropriate infrastructure
- Gender-responsive healthcare and transformative education
- Protection of biodiversity and agroforestry
- Sustainable regional and tourism development
- Preservation of cultural heritage
#schongenial: How do you combine your personal passion for the Himalayas with the practical work of EcoHimal, and what drives you personally to continue this work?
Kurt Luger : The Himalayas have been an integral part of my understanding of the world and my academic world for over 40 years, as I was head of the Department of Transcultural Communication until 2017 after completing my habilitation in the Department of Communication Studies in 1989. In Nepal and Tibet - involved in work processes, responsible for budgets and the proper use of tax funds - I gained intercultural practice and experience, which I was then able to bring to research and teaching at the university - in the sense of a cultural and social science perspective, which I was able to apply to the research fields of tourism and development policy.
Over the course of 30 years, the number of projects grew, new areas of development policy were added and ultimately led to the integrative project concept that we practise today, where one area intertwines with another. Circular economy, sufficiency, inclusion, participation, expertise, sustainability - these are not just buzzwords for us, but essential criteria for our work.
Whereas I used to spend many months in the country, today a stay of one month is enough. New communication technologies make it possible to monitor a project remotely. However, this requires competent project management on site. Ownership of a project must lie with the local stakeholders, which is why we transferred responsibility to our partner organisations and local actors at an early stage. Local experts can do almost anything, but they cannot access European funding pots without European partners.
Even after more than 30 years, I am still enchanted by the Himalayas with their colourful ethnic groups, bizarre cultural practices and rites, their incredibly beautiful landscapes and the enchanting smiles of the young women, even when they are carrying a basket with 40 kg of corn on their backs. Working with the dedicated men and women in the village communities and then seeing how a barren stretch of land becomes a green oasis of vegetables and fruit trees provides the gratification for some of the hardship that comes with the tasks.
#schongenial: Which UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) do the EcoHimal projects specifically contribute to?
Kurt Luger : With the exception of Goal 14, Life Below Water, all goals are relevant to our work and should be understood in such a way that projects strive for or realise these goals in their entirety. According to our focus in our work, the following goals, such as the eight-thousanders from the highlands of Tibet, still stand out:
1 No poverty, 2 No hunger, 3 Good health and well-being 4 Quality education 5 Gender equality 6 Clean water 7 Affordable and clean energy 11 Sustainable cities and communities 12 Sustainable consumption and production 13 Climate action 14 Life on land 17 Partnerships to achieve the goals.
#schongenial: You have been in contact with Rotary clubs in Austria, Switzerland and Kathmandu since 2015 as part of the reconstruction efforts following the earthquake in Nepal. How has the cooperation with Rotary International developed?
Kurt Luger : After the disastrous earthquake in 2015, which claimed 9,000 lives throughout Nepal and destroyed 25,000 school classes, a project was set up via Austrian and Swiss Rotary clubs, the main aim of which was to rebuild a completely destroyed village with around 250 houses on the Nepal-Tibet border. Rotary used matching funds to finance the construction of biogas plants and also made it possible to reforest an area on the edge of the village to stabilise the terrain. The project was realised by EcoHimal Nepal in cooperation with the Rotary Club Kathmandu Durbar Marg, whereby the managing director of EcoHimal Nepal is also a Rotarian, thus providing an excellent working basis.
Subsequently, we at EcoHimal have repeatedly sought co-operation with Rotary Clubs and have also built three schools together. The reconstruction of destroyed schools after the earthquake was an important task for EcoHimal for around ten years, and together with various partners we have built or renovated 43 earthquake-proof schools. Even today, school projects are a central component of our project work, not least with the campaign "The way out of poverty is the way to school", with which we enable children and young people affected by poverty to receive an education.
#schongenial: What synergies do you see between the values of EcoHimal and the basic principles of Rotary, and how do you think such partnerships can be made even more effective?
Kurt Luger: The objectives largely overlap, so I am very much in favour of such collaborations. However, not all Rotarians are also experts in development policy issues or have a profound understanding of the interrelationships in the remotest corners of the world. Cooperation with local Rotary clubs is therefore essential. But even that is no guarantee that a project will be handled competently. Rotarians work on a voluntary basis, and when in doubt, their own professional challenges are more pressing than the completion of a project.
I therefore advocate - as was the case in our Duguna Ghadi project, the reconstruction of the village and the cooperation with other partners - the transfer of project responsibility to suitable NGOs or companies with the appropriate technical expertise. However, the full involvement of all project partners and the local population in all key decisions must be guaranteed. This must be preceded by a participatory process regarding the project concept. I see Rotary in the role of financier, also responsible for controlling and of course involved in the development of the project. However, the implementation should not be based on voluntarism, at least that is my experience, because how can I hold someone accountable who has to prioritise and may have to neglect their own company as a result? There is still enough room for manoeuvre to give the project a Rotary image or to make the humanitarian, social, cultural and ethical motives associated with the Rotary values visible.
#schongenial: Finally, what advice would you like to give to 25-year-old Kurt Luger, who is interested in the issues of ecology and sustainability, especially in faraway countries?
Kurt Luger: The countries in the Global South are paying the price for what we have done to the planet over the past 70 years - and will continue to do! In order to put a stop to climate change to some extent, we need a rapid change in our lifestyles here and at the same time support for people in the South in order to be able to cope better with this change.
I don't see it any differently today than I did back then. We founded EcoHimal before Rio 92, before the World Climate Summit, but the issue was not as dominant back then as it is today. I was around 40, not radical, but convinced that the exploitation of planetary resources would have drastic consequences. The 25-year-old might have reacted more impetuously, perhaps tying himself to a lamp post in front of the Chancellery or the Ministry of Agriculture with a banner in his hand. But ultimately, this is just a fist in a sack - and in view of the hopelessness in the global context, just political sack racing. Showing solidarity with the poor - Carlos Fonseca, the poet of the Sandinista revolution, said that solidarity is the tenderness of the people - must not remain symbolic, so you have to lend a hand yourself and make the connections public. Ultimately, the glaciers are melting here and there, the mountain dwellers are exposed to similar threats and so an intercultural bridge can be built between the Alps and the Himalayas, the people there and there. In this way, we can also raise our awareness of development policy and realise that we are contemporaries and live in a neighbourhood.
A 25-year-old could be taught what the great German filmmaker Edgar Reitz wrote in his book Heimat - Weggehen um ankommen (Homeland - Leaving to Arrive ).
"We are not people who can be at home all over the world... But we learn in these years that we have time in common with all people on this globe. We are contemporaries of the most distant people. This creates a new sense of a new space, which is a time-space."
