Making a difference

At Live & Learn, we’re aiming to create resilient communities and an equitable future, free from poverty.

We work across six key thematic areas: climate change adaptation, environmental protection, disaster risk reduction and response, water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH), and gender and women’s empowerment.

While these often overlap, each is essential to creating a fairer and more sustainable future for us all.

Our work is integrated with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

These 17 goals, to be achieved by 2030, are a global partnership working towards poverty eradication, improved health and sanitation, reduced inequality, and the preservation of life on land and underwater - all while tackling climate change.

Climate resilience

Climate change is affecting countries across the Asia-Pacific region, especially small island states. Pacific Islands and the Maldives are particularly vulnerable to the threats of climate change due to their size, isolation and narrow economic base, while environmentally damaging behaviour like logging and mining has often lowered resilience against climate change. Extreme weather exacerbated by climate change is also threatening agriculture and food security, and the adaptive capacity of communities across the region is often limited by poor access to information, resources and new technologies.

Live & Learn is addressing these problems across the Asia-Pacific region in a number of ways - particularly through our Climate Resilient Islands Programe, which is working with communities in Vanuatu, Tonga, Fiji and Kiribati to strengthen their resilience to the impacts of climate change through nature-based approaches. Read more about this project here [hyperlink].

We are also working with communities to bolster food security through more reliable farming technologies and climate smart agriculture techniques; securing biodiversity with better forest management; integrating climate change adaptation into government planning and budgeting; learning and sharing local Indigenous knowledge; and more.

Environmental protection

Climate change is affecting countries across the Asia-Pacific region, especially small island states. Pacific Islands and the Maldives are particularly vulnerable to the threats of climate change due to their size, isolation and narrow economic base, while environmentally damaging behaviour like logging and mining has often lowered resilience against climate change. Extreme weather exacerbated by climate change is also threatening agriculture and food security, and the adaptive capacity of communities across the region is often limited by poor access to information, resources and new technologies.

Live & Learn is addressing these problems across the Asia-Pacific region in a number of ways - particularly through our Climate Resilient Islands Programe, which is working with communities in Vanuatu, Tonga, Fiji and Kiribati to strengthen their resilience to the impacts of climate change through nature-based approaches. Read more about this project here [hyperlink].

We are also working with communities to bolster food security through more reliable farming technologies and climate smart agriculture techniques; securing biodiversity with better forest management; integrating climate change adaptation into government planning and budgeting; learning and sharing local Indigenous knowledge; and more.

Water, sanitation and hygiene

Water, sanitation and hygiene is essential for eradicating extreme poverty and recovering from disasters. Live & Learn combines locally contextualised water and sanitation system designs with a rights-based approach so that marginalised communities and individuals are able to use their own skills and resources to provide safe water.

We implement projects that improve access to safe sanitation, promote positive hygiene behaviour change, protect the environment and help people recover and remain safe from disasters, including COVID-19.

Equality & inclusion

Empowering women, youth, people with disabilities, Indigenous peoples and other marginalised groups to participate fully in all aspects of life is essential to building stronger communities and improving the quality of life for all. Live & Learn recognises the inherent value of each person and aims to promote equality between all groups in society in every aspect of economic, social and political life.

Our focus is on strengthening the voices and agency of traditionally marginalised groups, promoting them as leaders and decision makers and enabling their economic development. From valuing and embracing the importance of Indigenous knowledge and rights, implementing and advocating for gender and socially inclusive programs and seeking to involve and include diverse groups in all our work, Live & Learn aims to ensure all people have the conditions they need for a flourishing life.

Disaster risk reduction & response

Live & Learn works in regions threatened by natural disasters such as cyclones, earthquakes, volcanoes, droughts and floods, in addition to COVID-19. These vulnerabilities are compounded by factors such as climate change, poorly planned coastal development, unplanned urban growth and land use, environmental and ecosystem degradation, and unsustainable use of natural resources, such as extensive logging and mining.

Building disaster resilience is crucial to eradicating extreme poverty and protecting communities from the impacts of climate and environmental breakdown. Live & Learn works with communities and governments to assess vulnerability and risk, integrate risk reduction into policy and budgeting, safeguard livelihoods and mobilise communities. Empowering women is prevalent throughout all our disaster risk reduction activities.

Our long-term partnerships with organisations such as CARE, MFAT, DFAT and others are key to work.

Food resilience

One of the biggest challenges being faced by people across Asia and the Pacific is food insecurity. While communities have historically been able to maintain food security, a reduction in arable land, import dependence, geographic remoteness and increasing urbanisation, among other factors, now threaten this. People across the region are increasingly vulnerable to malnutrition and global economic and supply chain fluctuations.

Live & Learn is working to address this issue across a number of programs, including Climate Resilient Islands and Atoll Food Futures. We are working with communities to bolster food resilience through more reliable and climate-smart agriculture techniques and technologies such as Biofilta Foodcubes, emphasising the importance of traditional knowledge regarding food sources, securing the biodiversity and ecosystems that assist agriculture, and more.

Live & Learn is working towards a future in which all people across Asia and the Pacific have reliable and resilient sources of healthy food.

Live & Learn works across a network of 10 countries from the Indian Ocean to Southeast Asia and the South Pacific.

Live & Learn makes an impact and changes lives across Asia and the Pacific. Learn more about our work through the stories and voices of our people and places.