Hollywood A-listers pledge to help Nepal

Two Hollywood stars from the highly anticipated superhero film ‘The Amazing Spider-Man 2’ have pledged to support two separate conservation projects in the Tarai plains of Nepal.

Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone aim to raise $10,000 each within the next 60 days through a crowdfunding and crowdsourcing platform launched by the World Wildlife Fund to celebrate this year’s Earth Hour. The WWF has been organising Earth Hour, the world’s largest celebration of planet Earth, by turning off the lights for an hour on March 28 since 2007.

Garfield, who plays the role of Peter Parker in the film, has chosen an Earth Hour project titled ‘A Flame Called Hope’ that aims to reduce the rate of deforestation by providing clean bio-gas energy for local communities living along the Terai Arc Landscape (TAL) in Nepal. Stone, the female lead, is supporting the ‘Puppy Protector’ project that focuses on training sniffer dog puppies and their handlers to track animals, find wildlife crime scenes, detect illegal trade items, and chase down poachers with rangers on the frontlines of Chitwan National Park, located along the western Tarai belt of the country.

Garfield who is also appointed as the first superhero Ambassador by  WWF, is backing the bio-gas initiative that will ultimately help transform the lives of children in communities of TAL by allowing them to go to school instead of accompanying their parents to collect firewood.  “Earth Hour gives you the power to inspire anyone, even if you’re just one person. There are great projects from the crowd, for the planet, happening all over the world,” Stone said in a WWF statement on Tuesday.

Earth Hour envisions the new crowdfunding and crowdsourcing platform will generate environmental outcomes by harnessing participants to help choose and raise funds for their favourite on-the-ground projects, the statement further read. Earlier, Leonardo DiCaprio and heavy rock band Linkin Park had supported projects in Nepal. DiCaprio supported tiger conservation programmes, while Linkin Park supported the installation of bio-gas plants.

source: the kathmandu post,26 feb 2014