Document is current

Article History

Received: 17 November 2023

Accepted: 20 January 2026

First Online: 11 May 2026

Competing interests

: The authors declare no competing interests.

: The research outlined here was part of the project FATE – Feminization, Agricultural Transition and Rural Employment. The project was funded by the Swiss Programme for Research on Global Issues for Development (r4d programme) under the grant number 400340_171191. All research for the FATE project was conducted in accordance with the ethical guidelines and regulations of the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) and the r4d programme requirements applicable at the time of the study. The r4d programme’s standard approval process did not require a separate institutional review board (IRB) or national ethics committee approval for this project, as no interventions or sensitive personal data were involved, so there are no dates relating to ethical approval. All procedures adhered to internationally recognised principles for research involving human participants, including informed consent and confidentiality safeguards. Separate approval was not required in Nepal; however, the research team from the Nepal Center for Contemporary Research (NCCR) informed the office of Rong Rural Municipality of the research objectives and data collection tools, ensuring that the study adhered to both local and Helsinki regulations. In the study region in Nepal, data were collected between October and December 2018 with the full consent of all research participants, who could withdraw from the study at any time during the interview. Data were fully anonymised for analysis and securely stored.

: The study involved human participants who were interviewed with qualitative and quantitative methods commonly employed in the social sciences. All participants were fully informed of the research objectives, and there were no risks to them of participating. Informed consent was obtained verbally from all participants regarding participation and data use directly before each interview conducted between October and December 2018. Consent was obtained verbally, as most respondents were illiterate. The response was noted in the tablet-based interview questionnaire, and there was a possibility to opt out at any time during the interview and withdraw data subsequently by contacting the research team.