The Community Trust Index measures the level of trust in the Nepal Red Cross Society by assessing its competencies and core values. It examines key subdimensions that shape trust perceptions, alongside community views on the Early Warning System. The findings highlight both strengths and areas for improvement, with the aim of strengthening community engagement and guiding policy development. Ultimately, the index seeks to foster a more trusted and cohesive environment, contributing to Nepal’s sustainable development and the well-being of its communities.

Sampling

The sampling employed a random stratified approach in selected districts where the Nepal Red Cross Society (NRCS) operates. Stratification was based on age group, gender, education status, with additional distinctions made between rural and urban municipalities to ensure representation across diverse communities.

The survey was conducted by the Nepal Red Cross Society (NRCS) in April and May 2025 as part of the Community Trust Index project. NRCS volunteers administered the questionnaire, focusing on issues of trust within the framework of the Building Trust initiative. In total, the survey reached 3,538 respondents across selected districts in the western provinces and the Kathmandu Valley.

See metrics: Metrics

Geographic

The sample distribution broadly reflects the population structure across the selected districts. Kathmandu (32.1% vs. 37.1%) is slightly under-represented, while Kailali (18.5% vs. 16.4%) and Banke (12.6% vs. 11%) are somewhat higher in the sample. Other districts show only minor differences compared to census data. At the province level, Sudur Paschim is over-represented, which will require post-stratification adjustment in the analysis.

Coverage

Gender and Age

The sample broadly reflects the population structure by age and gender. Women 18–39 are well aligned with census data, though women 40+ are slightly under-represented. Among men, the 18–39 group is close to population levels, while older men (60+) are over-represented. These small imbalances may require post-stratification adjustment.

Education

The education profile of the sample is closely aligned with population data. University and secondary levels match well (23.3% vs. 22.7% and 40.7% vs. 43.4%). Primary education is slightly under-represented (24.7% vs. 27.6%), while those with no formal education are somewhat over-represented (11.2% vs. 6.4%).

Employment

he available data on employment status is not directly comparable with official labour force statistics. According to the 2021 census, the employment rate was 49%, whereas the survey indicates a higher rate of over 70%. Within the survey, business (28.8%) and agriculture (24%) are the main sources of work, while 22% of respondents reported being unemployed (6% looking for work and 16% not looking). Smaller groups are engaged in full-time jobs (9.3%), irregular or informal work (7.1%), or are full-time students (8.9%). As no comparable population breakdown is available, these results should be interpreted with caution.

Source: https://censusnepal.cbs.gov.np/results/files/result-folder/Labour%20Force%20and%20Economic%20Activities%20in%20Nepal.pdf

Limitations

The data presented in this study should be interpreted with caution due to methodological limitations related to sampling and representativeness. While the survey provides valuable insights, certain groups and regions are over- or under-represented compared with census distributions. For example, Sudur Paschim province is over-represented, women aged 40+ are slightly under-represented, and older men are over-represented. Similarly, differences are observed in education levels, employment categories, and district representation.

To reduce these imbalances, post-stratification adjustments were applied using key variables such as age, gender, education, and employment status. These corrections improve comparability but cannot fully eliminate bias introduced by the sampling approach. As a result, the findings should be viewed as broadly indicative rather than fully representative of the wider population, and caution is advised when generalizing beyond the surveyed groups.

Survey Results

The charts below present the survey answers as percentages, offering visualization of the Community Trust levels by subdimensions. They illustrate the distribution of community’s perceptions of the competencies and values.

Perception of Early Warning System

Warning Dissemination and Communication

Preparedness & Response Capabilities

Others Questions

Contextual questions

This section presents findings on community members’ experiences with and behaviors toward the Red Cross. These questions explore interactions, perceptions, and engagement patterns, offering insights into how the Red Cross is viewed and utilized within the community.

Experiences

The survey shows that a large majority of respondents reported not having donated (76.1%) or volunteered (84.9%) with the Nepal Red Cross Society. By contrast, 42.8% reported having received aid or support, highlighting that engagement is more common through assistance than through contributions or volunteering.

Behaviours

The survey highlights mixed forms of engagement with the Nepal Red Cross Society. Few respondents reported voicing feedback (19.6%), recommending the Society (29.1%), or applying for services (17.7%). In contrast, a majority said they had shared information received (64.8%) or followed NRCS advice during a crisis (75.8%).

Intention

The data shows strong community trust in NRCS, with high likelihoods of sharing information, seeking support, volunteering, recommending, providing feedback, donating, and following crisis advice.

Score

This score is derived from responses to questions that assess perceptions of competencies and values, providing a comprehensive measure of trust. A higher score indicates stronger trust, suggesting that community members believe their needs are being addressed and their values are respected. Learn more about scoring method: Methods

Overall Score

The following charts present results for Warning Dissemination & Communication and Preparedness & Response Capabilities, each rated on a scale from 0 to 10.

For Warning Dissemination & Communication, the highest ratings are found in Effectiveness (6.73) and Inclusiveness (6.46), while Awareness (5.76) and Responsiveness (5.80) remain moderate. Participation (4.86) and Transparency (5.10) score lowest, highlighting clear areas for improvement.

In Preparedness & Response Capabilities, the strongest perceptions are in Feedback (6.49) and Awareness (6.37), followed by Inclusiveness (6.15). Transparency (5.13) again emerges as the weakest dimension, with Effectiveness (5.95) and Responsiveness (5.94) closer to the average.

The combined-score chart shows that Preparedness & Response generally outperforms Warning Dissemination & Communication, with the highest scores in Feedback (6.36), Effectiveness (6.34), and Inclusiveness (6.31). Awareness is moderate (6.07), while Participation (5.32) and Transparency (5.12) are lowest, highlighting key areas for improvement.

Overall, the findings suggest that while communities acknowledge strong effectiveness, feedback mechanisms, and inclusiveness in both dimensions, participation and transparency remain critical gaps requiring targeted attention.

Learn more about weighting process: Weighting

Scores by Pillar

Combined Pillar Scores

Dimension definition

Questions for Pillar 3
Subdimension Question
Awareness Do you think community members in general are aware of who/which actor sent early warning alerts in the case of floods?
Responsiveness Do you feel that early warnings have reached the community in time to take recommended action?
Effectiveness Are the early warnings and messages by Nepal Red Cross easy for your community/the affected community to understand?
Inclusiveness Do you think the alerts delivered by Nepal Red Cross were accessible to different community members, including the whole community, including vulnerable groups?
Participation Do you believe the communities were consulted when planning the warnings?
Feedback Would you feel comfortable providing a suggestion on or making a complaint about the warnings?
Transparency Do you feel that Nepal Red Cross shares information with your community/the affected community about how or when they issue warnings?
Questions for Pillar 4
Subdimension Question
Awareness Do you think the community members knew what actions to take in relation to the flood?
Responsiveness Do you think the response activities were quick enough?
Participation Prior to the event, were people in your community/the affected community involved in preparing for the hazard?
Effectiveness Do you think that the preparedness activities enabled your community/the affected community to respond effectively to warnings?
Feedback Would you feel comfortable providing a suggestion on or making a complaint about the preparedness or response activities?
Inclusiveness Do you believe the disaster response considered the needs of vulnerable groups?
Transparency Do you feel that Nepal Red Cross shares information with your community/the affected community about how their activities are planned and conducted?

Score by factors

This chart compares scores for Warning Dissemination & Communication and Preparedness & Response Capabilities across different demographic and contextual groups.

Overall, results show:

  • higher ratings among younger respondents, those with higher education, rural residents, and individuals engaged in work or volunteering.

  • District-level variation is also notable, with Banke and Bhaktapur showing the strongest scores, while Kathmandu and Lalitpur consistently perform lower.

A key insight is that previous engagement—such as volunteering, receiving early warnings, or being a program beneficiary—correlates with significantly higher trust and capacity scores, underscoring the importance of direct community involvement in strengthening early warning systems.

Distribution of mean scores for values and competencies per demographic questions

Score by respondent profile

This chart compares perceptions of Warning Dissemination & Communication (left) and Preparedness & Response Capabilities (right) across three groups: beneficiaries, volunteers, and others. Overall, volunteers consistently report the highest scores across both dimensions, followed closely by others, while beneficiaries provide notably lower ratings.

For Warning Dissemination & Communication, volunteers rate highest in inclusiveness (7.46), effectiveness (7.65), and feedback (7.38), while beneficiaries give much lower scores, particularly for participation (4.04) and transparency (4.27). Similarly, in Preparedness & Response Capabilities, volunteers again score highest in awareness (7.59) and inclusiveness (7.16), whereas beneficiaries lag behind in almost every area, with the lowest ratings for participation (5.01) and effectiveness (5.25).

The findings highlight a clear gap in perceptions: while volunteers and others recognize strong performance in inclusiveness, effectiveness, and feedback, beneficiaries consistently feel less engaged and less informed, underscoring the need to strengthen communication, participation, and transparency for those most directly affected.

Methods and Metrics

Metrics

Gender

Respondents by Gender
Gender Total Respondents Percentage (%)
Female 1643 50.2
Male 1632 49.8
Other or did not answer 0 0.0
Total 3275 100.0

Age

Respondents by Age Group
Age Group Total Respondents Percentage (%)
18-39 1780 54.4
40-59 938 28.6
60+ 557 17.0

Geographic

Respondents by District and Region
Region District Total Respondents Percentage (%)
Bagmati Kathmandu 1051 65.9
Bagmati Lalitpur 307 19.2
Bagmati Bhaktapur 238 14.9
Bagmati TOTAL 1596 100.0
Lumbini Banke 412 56.4
Lumbini Bardiya 319 43.6
Lumbini TOTAL 731 100.0
Sudur Paschim Kailali 607 64.0
Sudur Paschim Kanchanpur 341 36.0
Sudur Paschim TOTAL 948 100.0

Relationship with RC

Respondents by relationship with RC
Profile Total Respondents
Aid recipient 1401
Volunteer 495
Other 1699

Methods

Scoring methodology

To determine the score, we employ the following method:

  1. Survey Structure The CTI survey includes multiple questions grouped under sub-dimensions of two main categories:
    • Competencies (e.g., reliability, effectiveness, technical proficiency)
    • Values (e.g., ethics, integrity, fairness, transparency)

  1. Sub-Dimension Scoring

    Each sub-dimension comprises several survey items (questions).Respondents answer on a Likert-type scale (1 to 4 - Don’t not is excluded). For each sub-dimension:

    Sub-dimension Score = ∑ (Weighted Response Scores) / Number of Items

If weights are not empirically derived, equal weighting is typically applied to each item.

  1. Dimension Scoring

Once all sub-dimension scores are calculated, the Competency Score and Values Score are each derived as the arithmetic mean of their respective sub-dimension scores:

  • Competency Score = ∑(Sub-dimension Scores for Competency) /𝑛

  • Values Score = ∑(Sub-dimension Scores for Values)/𝑚

where 𝑛 and 𝑚 are the number of sub-dimensions in each category.

  1. Overall Scoring

    The final Community Trust Index score is the arithmetic mean of the Competency and Values scores:

  • CTI Score = (Competency Score + Values Score)/2

Weighting

Weighting vs. unweighting

To correct demographic deviations from the overall population, we applied a technique called raking. This method adjusts results based on variables such as age, gender, province, education level, and geographic (urban/rural) to align the sample with the population distribution. Data sources included the 2021 Nepal Population and Housing Census (Central Bureau of Statistics, https://censusnepal.cbs.gov.np/Home/Index/EN).

The weighted results are broadly consistent with the unweighted data, with only small variations across most dimensions. In both dissemination and response, the general trends remain unchanged, with effectiveness, feedback, and inclusiveness scoring higher, while participation and transparency lag behind. The largest differences appear in participation and transparency, where weighted scores are slightly lower than unweighted, suggesting that weighting reduces averages marginally but does not substantially change the overall performance patterns across dimensions.

Drivers Correlation

Correlation matrix

This chart presents the correlation between sub-dimensions of Warning Dissemination (left) and Response (right). Overall scores are strongly correlated with all sub-dimensions in both cases, confirming their consistency as composite measures. For Dissemination, the strongest internal link is between Effectiveness and Inclusiveness (0.61), while for Response, particularly strong correlations appear between Effectiveness, Participation, and Responsiveness (0.65–0.67). Transparency shows moderate but consistent correlations across both dimensions.

These results suggest that improvements in effectiveness, participation, and responsiveness are especially influential in shaping overall performance perceptions.

Significance testing

Significance testing

When testing for significant differences between groups, a t-test was used to compare mean scores across dissemination and response questions. The table summarizes whether differences between volunteers, beneficiaries, and others are statistically significant. Results show that, at a 95% confidence level with multiple-comparison correction, volunteers differ significantly from both beneficiaries and others across nearly all dimensions. Beneficiaries and others also show significant differences in most cases, except for awareness in dissemination and effectiveness in response, where no significant gap was observed.

Pillar Drivers Volunteer-Other Volunteer-Beneficiary Benficiary-Other
Dissemination Awareness Yes No Yes
Dissemination Responsiveness Yes Yes Yes
Dissemination Effectiveness Yes Yes Yes
Dissemination Inclusiveness Yes Yes Yes
Dissemination Participation Yes Yes Yes
Dissemination Feedback Yes Yes Yes
Dissemination Transparency Yes Yes Yes
Response Awareness Yes Yes Yes
Response Responsiveness Yes Yes Yes
Response Participation Yes Yes Yes
Response Effectiveness Yes No Yes
Response Feedback Yes Yes Yes
Response Inclusiveness Yes Yes Yes
Response Transparency Yes Yes Yes