diff --git a/adapters/env.sh b/adapters/env.sh
new file mode 100644
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--- /dev/null
+++ b/adapters/env.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,29 @@
+# Copyright 2017-present Open Networking Foundation
+#
+# Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+# you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+# You may obtain a copy of the License at
+#
+# http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+#
+# Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+# distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+# WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+# See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+# limitations under the License.
+# sourcing this file is needed to make local development and integration testing work
+export VOLTHA_BASE=$PWD
+
+# load local python virtualenv if exists, otherwise create it
+VENVDIR="venv-$(uname -s | tr '[:upper:]' '[:lower:]')"
+if [ ! -e "$VENVDIR/.built" ]; then
+    echo "~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~"
+    echo "Initializing OS-appropriate virtual env."
+    echo "This will take a few minutes."
+    echo "~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~"
+    make venv
+fi
+. $VENVDIR/bin/activate
+
+# add top-level voltha dir to pythonpath
+export PYTHONPATH=$VOLTHA_BASE/$VENVDIR/lib/python2.7/site-packages:$PYTHONPATH:$VOLTHA_BASE:$VOLTHA_BASE/protos/third_party