Ashok Kumar Facilitating women farmers for lasting development
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Ashok Kumar Facilitating women farmers for lasting development
- 1. Facilitating women farmers for lasting development outcomes on the East India Plateau Partnerships for Progress A Kumar2, WD Bellotti1, A Komarek1, A Choudhary2, PS Cornish1, et al LWR/2002/100 Water harvesting and better cropping systems for the benefit of small farmers in watersheds of the East India Plateau LWR/2010/082 Improving livelihoods with innovative cropping systems on the East India Plateau
- 2. The story is about.. • Socio-economic and biophysical variability in EIP • Enabling farmers particularly women is key to bring-out sustainable change in human condition • Context specific learning/decision making tools which can be institutionalized in development agencies.
- 3. Introduction to PRADAN (www.pradan.net) PRADAN Today: In Poorest Districts of India • • • • • • ~272 Thousand families, ~ 1 million population 8,300 habitations, 19,000 women SHGs, 44 districts, 7 states. Social Composition OBC 26% SC 15% Purulia Others 2% ST 57%
- 4. Rice on medium uplands - EIP Theme 1 Why is it so? Does it need to be this way? What can be done about it?
- 5. Rainfall varies from year-to-year But what about soil water and ponding The duration of ponding in medium uplands is much more variable even than rainfall (0-106 days) This why transplanted rice crops fail so often
- 6. Multi-partner approach to Action Research Plan Do Plan Do Reflect Observe Observe Taking a “learning approach”, and learning to reflect, are amongst the most important process adopted all through
- 7. The role division in Agriculture: Women as Farmers ! Male (%) Female (%) Jointly (%) Seed Selection 93 5 2 Broadcasting seeds 37 33 30 FYM usage 2 98 0 Process Ploughing and puddling Uprooting of paddy seedlings 100 3 Transplantation of seedlings Tools Traditional plough 97 100 Manual Women do much of the physical work in agriculture – yet do not think of themselves as farmers Choice of fertilizers 92 3 5 Fertilizer application 88 1 11 Irrigation 29 15 56 Crop Monitoring 25 6 69 Weeding Using of pesticides 100 99 Pesticide Sprayer 100 Reaping 1 Traditional sickle Bringing paddy for threshing 31 8 61 Manually/ Bullock cart Paddy threshing 5 23 72 Manually/ Thresher Processing paddy Marketing agricultural product 100 100
- 8. What we did In addition to regular SHG development with ACIAR scientists .... • A series of jointly-designed workshop and field research activities designed to meet our needs as scientists, and at the same time, progressively build capacity in the community Perceptions (of self and resources) Knowledge (soil, fertiliser, water, crop choice etc) Skills • Together with these activities, we observed the process and gathered relevant sociological data
- 9. • • • • • • • Process followed.. The planning meetings not held without women The research questions decided in a joint meeting Farmers participating in research activities decided by SHGs Progress review at regular intervals- weekly Discussion on the problems and concerns- find solution Equal partner with the men in grounding the trials Designed field visits to the research plots and reflections – share their observations and reflect • The learning’s shared to all women through weekly SHG meetings. • At the end of trials- the learning shared with the villagers, presence of women in large numbers.
- 10. Rain-fed cropping with non-flooded crops (including aerobic rice) a safer option than paddy Rainfed – bunds open Soil water in medium uplands with no ponding, Pogro 2006-2011
- 11. Results
- 12. In project villages cropping systems are becoming more intensive and diverse Crop intensification and diversification in Amagara during the post-monsoon rabi seasons of 2007 (left) and 2011 (right). All of the crop in 2007 was experiments with farmers except boro rice
- 13. Tools for Outscaling: Season-Landscape Crop Matrix Learning Tool
- 14. Self Help Groups planning ‘year-round’ cropping
- 15. Impacts • Change in perception towards self, their land and Water • The cropping intensity and diversity has increased – 3 crops to 10 crops, The cash flow in the families doubled. • Action Learning Cycle as effective learning tool • Trans-disciplinary collaborations to address poverty, learning and perception related issues • Learnings incorporated in ongoing large development project and in-house staff training for out-scaling • NGOs acceptable as scientific research partners • A follow-up Research cum Development project with ACIAR & AusAid to address sustainability
- 16. Acknowledgements Special thanks to Prof Peter Cornish - “Dadu”
Editor's Notes
- This is research for development, with research on process of engagement (the focus of this presentation, if this is your plan) as important as research on cropping systems (of which you provide only context and key findings, if you plan to focus on process). The partnership is between Australian scientists, PRADAN and villagers, with a particular focus on finding ways to effectively engage women.This paper reports the original research plus out-scaling to other villages using the lessons learnt Remember to say at the end what those lessons were!
- 1. There is a lot of Socio-economic and biophysical variability exists in EIP, and under such condition no one recommendation/solution is going to work all across. The soil fertility, soil water, rainfall, perception towards self and land resources are quite variable.2. Enabling farmers particularly women is key to bring-out sustainable change in human condition particularly livelihoods and self perception. Action learning cycle with participatory action research are enabling methodologies emerged in this project3. It is scaleable as context specific learning/decision making tools are developed, and these can be institutionalized in development agencies
- See my notes on your landscape slide…. Consider deleting it and using only this one (but keep the point about small areas of land in different landscape positions. PRADAN has a good slide you use to show the landscape and these names – is it in theNRM manual?On the Plateau, monoculture rice is by far the main crop (no irrigation) and the vast majority of rice area is medium uplands like this … drought is common despite high rainfallThis slide leads into the next two (after A Learning, as I’ve rearranged them), the first on women doing much of the work but not seeing themselves as farmers and the other on drought and rice, the water balanceMessages are about research on finding out why rice fails so often on medium uplands, ways of growing rice in a less risky way, and of crop options that can use water more effectively? Or is about how you learnt those lessons (participation that creates new knowledge for everyone, engaging women in a different way – as farmers not just as SHG members with a narrower role), and how you are now engaging more widely with families in learning about new cropping systems and implementing them (if this is what PRADAN is now doing)Irrigation is less than 10% of net cropped area. There is lot of variability in Soil fertility and Soil water among the land classes as well as within the land class, due to plenty of human activities in the landscape. People are practicing levelling and bunding to grow transplanted rice wherever possible. Could you jump straight to the next slide, and use it to introduce the biophysical problem of drought and low rice yields and dependency on monocropped rice (no irrigation); and the socioeconomic problems that ensue
- These are vital insights from biophysical research, but you might find this hard to convey to your audience in a minute or so – you need to say it was measurement and modelling, and is the soil water balance – this takes time you may not have. Consider a few bullet points instead with some illustrative photos.A summary of the biophysical research is:Rainfall is high and variable (the reason people say the region is drought prone) BUT duration of ponding is much more variable, and explains why (with no irrigation) rice fails often and yields are generally low … there is no ready solution to this because low yields may come form late planting, delayed transplanting , periodic draining of fields and/or early draining of fields. Each of these problems requires its own solutionWithout the need for ponding, there is more than enough rain in even the driest year for ‘aerobic’ rice or other non-ponded kharif crops… we found this in participatory experiments with farmersIn most years there is enough soil water left for a rabi crop, with little or no irrigationCONCLUDE … climate-responsive cropping with the right crops in the right place can reduce risks and increase productivity and food security
- This action learning cycle is the non negotiable approach to conduct research activity.Some research is biophysical, others socioeconomic. (BUT this isnot the whole of the project)The research gave insights into both new technology and how to engage better with communities, so in addition to the AL you applied new principles (Avijitsupscaling work) that you will describe here
- Higher drainage rate says results apply in better drained soils and even if soils improve after rice
- Refer Hindustan Times article – we need a more replicable approach (without subsidies, climate resilient, and sustained long after professional support has moved on)fore first animation …
- This tool helps the farmers to make more informed choices considering the Water availability (rainfall & Residual water), crop duration and water requirements of the crops
- Community means the research community (farmers, Scientists, development workers)