The Pendeba Society Met “Vale Award” Evaluation Team in Nyingchi
On May 14, 2011, staff of The Pendeba Society went to Bayi Town in Nyingchi Prefecture, Tibet to meet with the experts and staff of the “Vale Award” Evaluation Team. The “Vale Award” is organized by the Ministry of Environmental Protection’s Center for Environmental Education and Communication (CEEC) and Vale Minerals China, jointly with Shanghai United Foundation (Lianquan). The Pendeba Society is honored to be the first NGO that was nominated for the award in the Tibet Autonomous Region. Attendees included members of the evaluation team such as Mr. XI Zhinong, founder of Wild China Film, Ms. LU Yang of CEEC and Ms. HU Heng of Lianquan, and Mr. Cili Nongbu of FutureGenerations China, Mr. Tsering Norbu and Mr. LIU Rongkun of The Pendeba Society.
At the meeting, Tsering Norbu first introduced to the evaluation team general information about the Qomolangma National Nature Preserve, then the background of The Pendeba Society and what The Pendeba Society has achieved since its foundation. During the presentation, all the members of the evaluation team expressed their encouragement and support to our work, as well as contributive comments and suggestions, which were of great help to The Pendeba Society’s work in the future.
In the afternoon, The Pendeba Society organized a tour for the evaluation team to villages around Nyingchi County, looking for pendebas of our previous trainings. Successfully, we found a senior pendeba in a village called Jiuba near Bayi Town, who happened to be Jiuba Village’s head as well. We had a very pleasant conversation with this senior pendeba in his new house through which the evaluation team got a better idea of what the Pendeba Program was. According to the pendeba, in his village there are totally seven pendebas who attended the previous pendeba trainings that were focusing on public health, environmental conservation and sustainable livelihoods. At present, the village is famous for its organic strawberry, which has largely helped villagers increase their household income in recent years. And the senior pendeba later showed us to their strawberry greenhouses where we saw many local villagers work on their strawberry plants busily and happily. The evaluation team also interviewed another senior pendeba, Tashi Tsering, who once worked as the director of Nyalam County’s Health Bureau, by which the team better understood the projects undertaken by the Pendeba Program in QNNP.
When the tour ended, the evaluation team was very satisfied with the results and showed their support and praises toward The Pendeba Society’s work and achievements. They also saw the Pendeba Program as one of the most competitive candidates for the “Vale Award.” In the meantime, The Pendeba Society also expressed sincere gratitude to the evaluation team and their suggestions, and hoped that evaluation team members would visit us again in Tingri, and have a close-up interaction and communication with our pendebas from QNNP.