India host the world’s largest stunted population on the planet with over 42 million kids and their families impacted. This is the grand epicenter of stunting and its an area GlobalRise has focused on for the past 3 years. Leaning on local organizations and universities that are fluent in the complex dynamics of India is essential for driving impact.
In 2025, GlobalRise was selected by an academic team at UPES, a highly ranked university located in the Himalayan foot hills in the city of Dehradun, Uttarakhand, to participate in HIMALAYA CALLING 20205 – a ground breaking event drawing government, academia, global NGOs, the private sector and others to tackle regional issues that are prevalent in the Himalayan region (see https://hillupes.com).
The prevalence of stunting in Uttarakhand and Bihar is significantly higher than most areas of India, making the issue of chronic malnutrition a high development priority. With the work and development tools created by GlobalRise to tackle similar issues in the Rwenzori Mountains of southwest Uganda, like Digital Food Systems and their underlying Geospatial Nutrition Profiles or GNPs, H.I.L.L., an institute within UPES, and GlobalRise found common ground.
The Conference yielded an official Memorandum of Understanding between the organizations and includes the potential work with the other participating organizations to develop a consortium focused on mountain development challenges like food security and nutrition, environment and water and other key issues.
Today, GlobalRise is just beginning its work with HILL to evolve a common understanding with the potential to develop discreet development tools that can be tested and deployed across the Himalayan region. This involves a local, multi-stakeholder effort where GlobalRise provides expertise and guidance to engineer an effective, evidence-based intervention(s) that helps kids in the Himalayan region.