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The report analyzes gender disparities, gender-based violence (GBV), and socio-economic conditions in four project sites in Pakistan to integrate gender-responsive strategies into the Recharge Pakistan project. It identifies significant gaps in women's access to land, decision-making, and education, while highlighting the disproportionate impact of climate change on rural women. The document concludes with a Gender Action Plan that includes specific targets for women's participation in EbA interventions, the establishment of survivor-centered grievance mechanisms for GBV and SEAH, and capacity building for both community members and WWF staff.

As of March 2022, India had installed 110 GW of renewable energy (RE) capacity, representing 63% of its 175 GW target for December 2022. Progress is highly uneven across states; while Telangana, Rajasthan, Karnataka, and Andaman and Nicobar have surpassed their targets, 27 states and union territories have achieved less than 50% of their goals. Five states—Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, and Tamil Nadu—account for two-thirds of the national shortfall. Recent growth has been heavily concentrated in Rajasthan and Gujarat, which together provided 73% of new RE capacity between October 2021 and March 2022. To meet the 2030 target of 450 GW RE, India requires an average annual addition of 42.5 GW.

The Pakistan Distributed Solar Project (PDSP), submitted by JS Bank, aims to increase the adoption of distributed solar PV systems in Pakistan. The project requests USD 10 million from the Green Climate Fund (GCF), consisting of a USD 9 million Pro-Rata Risk Sharing Guarantee and a USD 1 million grant for awareness and capacity building. The project targets the installation of approximately 43.15 MW of solar capacity for 4,000 customers across residential, agricultural, and SME sectors over 10 years. It specifically focuses on reducing collateral requirements and improving financial access for women entrepreneurs and women-led households. The project expects to reduce GHG emissions by 848,700 tCO2eq over a 34-year lifespan.

The report finds that agricultural electricity subsidies in Haryana are regressive, with the wealthiest farmers receiving a disproportionate share of benefits. It suggests transitioning to solar-powered irrigation via the PM-KUSUM scheme, introducing slab-based tariffs, and improving the identification of poor farmers through inter-agency coordination.

The research identifies systemic feedbacks that lock the Punjab agricultural system into crop residue burning despite legal barriers and the existence of more profitable alternatives. It concludes that while government policy is necessary, achieving sustainability requires transformative shifts toward crop diversification, circular business models, and green financing, with financial institutions playing a key role in leveraging these changes.

The document outlines a framework for the sustainable deployment of solar irrigation in India, focusing on the water-energy-food (WEF) nexus. It provides detailed guidance across five key areas: inter-departmental coordination, financing and affordability, beneficiary targeting, infrastructure support, and monitoring and evaluation (M&E). The guide emphasizes the need to protect groundwater resources, support small and marginal farmers, and transition away from high-subsidy models through innovative financing and ownership structures.

The Supreme Court of Pakistan rejected a constitutional challenge by the D.G. Khan Cement Company against a Punjab government notification barring cement plant construction or expansion in "Negative Areas". The court ruled that the ban was a proper climate resilient measure based on a consultant report warning of groundwater depletion and other environmental harms. The decision integrated the precautionary principle, the rights of nature, and the concept of "climate democracy" into the interpretation of fundamental rights under Pakistan's Constitution, emphasizing intergenerational justice and the need to protect water resources from climate change.

The proposal seeks USD 396,803 to address post-accreditation capacity gaps in the NRSP and update Pakistan's outdated 2017 GCF Country Programme to better align climate investments with current national priorities.

The report argues that India's post-pandemic recovery should prioritize 'building back better' by investing in natural capital and nature-based solutions (NbS). It examines the role of public and private finance, the need for a green finance taxonomy, and the importance of integrating biodiversity values into agriculture, infrastructure, and sub-national climate action plans. Key focus areas include land restoration targets, the conservation of wetlands within the Central Asian Flyway, and the mitigation of illegal wildlife trade.

The Land Accelerator South Asia program, launched by the World Resources Institute (WRI) in 2020, supports entrepreneurs developing business models to restore degraded lands. The 2021 cohort grew to 58 entrepreneurs, with women's participation increasing from 13% in 2020 to 31% in 2021. The program provides mentorship, grants, and connections to impact investors to scale solutions in sustainable agriculture, agroforestry, and agritech. This booklet highlights eleven specific startups, detailing their technological solutions—such as AI-based weeding robots, drone-based precision agriculture, and bio-economic waste conversion—and their reported socio-economic and environmental impacts, including increased farmer incomes and carbon sequestration.

The author contends that the Indian government's response to Covid-19 was characterized by a lack of preparedness, the scapegoating of the Muslim community, and a sudden lockdown that stranded millions of migrant workers. The text asserts that the state leveraged the crisis to arrest activists, create a non-transparent relief fund (PM-CARES), and weaken environmental regulations through the Environment Impact Assessment Draft 2020 to favor private capital.

The author contends that humanity's 'ruthless' treatment of nature and a 'mad rush to grow' have led to the Anthropocene, where human activity is the primary driver of planetary change. Using the COVID-19 pandemic as a catalyst, the text argues that the virus reveals the failure of legal instruments and international climate agreements, such as the COPs, to maintain ecological balance. The author highlights observed environmental improvements during lockdowns—such as purer air in the Paris region and China, and increased visibility of the Himalayas from Punjab—as evidence of nature's resilience. The document concludes by calling for environmental protection programs to be executed with the same urgency and boldness as monetary and investment policies.

The report assesses gender dynamics in Pakistan's Indus River Basin to inform a climate resilience project. It finds that while women perform the bulk of livestock management and significant crop labor, they lack land ownership, decision-making power, and access to technical resources. The document proposes 'Women Open Schools' and targeted technical training to empower female farmers and young women as catalysts for climate adaptation.

The 'Recharge Pakistan' project is a 10-year initiative (2020-2030) designed to shift Pakistan's flood management from a reliance on 'grey' hard-infrastructure to 'green' ecosystem-based adaptation (EbA). With an indicative total cost of USD 150 million, the project aims to reduce flood risk and enhance groundwater recharge at six selected sites along a 1,300km stretch of the Indus River. The project targets direct benefits for 10 million people and indirect benefits for 20 million others by restoring wetlands, managing hill torrents, and diversifying community livelihoods. It is led by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) as the Accredited Entity, with the Federal Flood Commission and the Ministry of Climate Change serving as executing entities.

The research uses an electronic survey of 1,414 urban Indian respondents to analyze what motivates hostile attitudes and the approval of violence in the Hindu-Muslim conflict. The study finds that security concerns for the future are the strongest predictors of hostility, while positive personal experiences with the out-group correlate with reduced hostility. In contrast, past experiences of violence do not systematically perpetuate hostility, and family histories of forced relocation are robustly associated with a non-adversarial outlook. Using Finite Mixture Models, the author determines that 'bottom-up' mechanisms (security concerns and prejudice) account for 82% of the sample, suggesting that individual-level dynamics are more influential than top-down elite manipulation for the majority of the population.

The document argues that women's economic empowerment (WEE) strategies in South and Southeast Asian agriculture often fail to achieve gender equality because they ignore systemic patriarchal norms and power imbalances. It identifies four primary barriers: the perception of women as secondary labour, the gap between legal access and actual control over resources, the confinement of women to low-value stages of the agricultural value chain, and gender-blind policy implementation. The author contends that economic growth and market inclusion do not automatically lead to gender equality. To address this, the briefing recommends positioning social equality as central to projects, facilitating power negotiations, supporting collective action for women, and ensuring gender-responsive policy implementation across ministerial bodies.

The document outlines proposed amendments to India's Electricity Act 2003 to introduce direct benefit transfers for subsidies and promote renewable energy. It notes a government ambition to increase its renewable energy target to 225 GW by 2022, though external analysts are less optimistic. The report highlights a rising fiscal burden from oil subsidies, potentially reaching USD 7.4 billion in FY2019, and details significant financial stress in the power sector. Additionally, it covers the expansion of LPG connections for poor women and the transition of several states to become kerosene-free.

The report evaluates the CAPEX loan model as a way to scale rooftop solar for Indian MSMEs, who struggle with the high upfront costs of the CAPEX cash model and the bankability issues of the RESCO model. Analysis shows the CAPEX loan model can be up to 14% cheaper than the RESCO model, primarily due to accelerated depreciation benefits. However, adoption is hindered by lender disinterest—driven by perceived credit risks and high transaction costs for small projects—and a lack of awareness among MSMEs. The authors recommend implementing partial risk guarantee funds, mandatory O&M contracts, EPC performance guarantees, and standardized solar loan products to mitigate these risks and reduce costs.

The document outlines four key actions for state, provincial, and regional governments to address land use's role in climate change: sustainable land management, open space conservation, agricultural methane capture, and regenerative agriculture. It emphasizes that land use is best managed at the subnational level to capture rural impacts and cross-jurisdictional effects, noting that while agriculture, forestry, and other land use account for 24% of global emissions, the sector can offset this by 20% through carbon removal.

The proposal seeks USD 100 million in senior loans from the GCF, matched by USD 100 million from Tata Cleantech Capital Limited (TCCL) and USD 50 million in project developer equity. The programme aims to install 250 MW of solar rooftop capacity between 2018 and 2023, targeting an indicative lifetime emission reduction of approximately 5.2 million tCO2eq. TCCL will act as the executing entity, providing loans to developers to overcome barriers such as the lack of long-term debt financing (12-15 years) and high perceived risks in the rooftop solar segment. The programme specifically targets the commercial and industrial (C&I) sector for 65-70% of funds, with the remainder for institutional, social, and residential sectors, including a focus on MSMEs and vulnerable communities.