Photo Credit: Marigold garlands prepared for marketing
Rayagada is a tribal populated district in the southern part of Odisha. Each year it gets around 1200 mm rainfall. The primary occupation of the people of Rayagada is agriculture followed by wage labor. Paddy is the dominant crop, primarily grown for consumption though cotton is also cultivated in large patches, for commercial purposes. Vegetable farming was identified as a great alternative to cotton farming as experience showed that vegetable farming gives the same income as cotton in one tenth the area - on an average, the farmers could gain a profit of Rs.10,000-20,000 per acre from cotton farming with a cropping cycle of nine months. However, this income can be gained from 10 decimal of vegetable cultivation with a cropping cycle of six months.
Photo Credit: 1 acre patch brinjal cultivated by a farmer
Photo Credit: Plucking of Brinjal
Photo Credit: Doorstep Marketing
The major reasons why the farmers were not willing to adopt vegetable cultivation were as follows:
On the other hand, all these issues were addressed by the money lenders in the case of cotton cultivation. As a result, the community preferred cotton over vegetable despite the differential profit potential.
Photo Credit: Jayanti Patika
Photo Credit: Kumari Kadraka in her chilly field
Photo Credit: Village level community marketing
Photo Credit: Doorstep Input Delivery
To address the above problems and promote largescale vegetable cultivation the FPO – Mahila Pragati Farmers Producer Company Ltd. - formed and registered under the aegis of the project, prepared a systemic end to end intervention plan:
Farmer representatives were exposed to different agricultural lands and markets where vegetable was grown and traded on scale, respectively. The representatives after seeing the market demand and agroclimatic suitability identified five winner crops (Brinjal, chilly, Beans, Sweetcorn and marigold) to be adopted for farming by their community. The farmers were organized into Producer Groups. Each producer group adopts 1-2 winner crop for a year. Presently there are 23 producer groups present in the Kolnara block of Rayagada district with 3000 members. The concept of community nursery was seeded in to facilitate synchronized farming. Under this approach all farmers of the village prepare the nursery and transplant the seedling on the same day. This ensures that production can be initiated at the same time.
The FPO engaged with various government departments like OLM (Odisha Livelihood Mission) and Mission Shakti to help SHGs in getting credit from block and gram panchayat level federations. This helped 300 women farmers access credit and adopt their winner crops.
To allow the farmers more time on field, the FPO appointed business promoters (who graduate to become Agri-Entrepreneurs over time) for procuring farming inputs from the market. The business promoters procure different seeds and pesticides from the FPO and deliver to the farmers. The business promoters also keep few medicines with them for emergency need. This intervention not only ensures easy access of agriculture inputs for the farmers but also reduces their travel cost.
Assurance of quality and timely input is one of the important needs for growing vegetables. The FPO took up direct engagement with various companies (like VNR, HyVeg, Kalas, Multiplex and Bayer) to ensure supply of quality inputs. The share capital and advances collected from the farmers helped the FPO negotiate better prices and deliver timely inputs even during the lock down.
Besides supplying pesticides the business promoters visit the farmers’ plots to identify some of the basic crop diseases and prescribe the treatment.
As marketing was the biggest concern among the farmers, the FPO assured doorstep picking up of the vegetable produce. Linkage with multiple markets was created through respective local contacts. The business promoter aggregates the commodities at the village level and the FPO arranges to send the aggregated produce to pre- contacted markets.
While FPOs may take about one-two months’ time to realize the price of the produce sold, the small and marginal farmer members need immediate cash for their daily needs. The FPO thus organized its working capital needs through linkages with NBFCs and ensured timely payment to farmers.
A rate chart of different crops, along with the deductible charges is maintained at the village level to ensure transparency in accounting.
Photo Credit: Shorting and grading by farmer
Photo Credit: Community Nursery
The FPO has recorded a turnover of INR 4.2 Mn, selling 2350 quintal of vegetables and some agri-inputs, in one year. 81% of this revenue was paid out to the member farmers as their cost realization.
Rayagada has already begun to create an identity of its own in the nearby markets as a source of quality vegetables. The sense of identity is strong even at a personal level, for many women who had an almost invisible existence for many years. Mami Pedenti, a director on the FPO Board, captures it well – “The journey from the kitchen to the Director’s office has been long and trying. But I have been able to create my own identity in the process.”
Seeing the success of the initiative the state is extending its support to the farmers, creating irrigation infrastructure and providing input support to help increase the area under vegetable farming.
Photo Credit: Crop visited by honorable SCST minister, Odisha
Special inputs: Sudhir Sahni, New Delhi
Organization: Professional Assistance for Development Action
Designation: Employment Facilitator
Number of Positions: 1
Locations: 1)Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu
PRADAN aims at providing relevant employability skills to young women from its states of operation – Odisha, Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh- and help them get linked to appropriate employment opportunities. A major destination of employment is in the four southern states of Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Delhi NCR Region in potential sectors such as manufacturing, automotive, e-commerce, garments, textiles, hospitality, healthcare and retail industry. PRADAN is looking for a person to liaison with employers and young women who are engaged so that they work in a dignified work environment, able to retain themselves and build a long-term career for themselves. The person would be reporting to Integrator, PRADAN.
Key Deliverables:
QUALIFICATIONS, EXPERIENCE AND COMPETENCIES:
Education
Applicants must have Degree/Post Graduate Degree/ Diploma preferably in Social Sciences, Rural Development/ Management or equivalent, from a reputed institute.
Experience
(1) Minimum 3 to 5 years of experience in rural / urban development / skilling / employability programmes.
(2) Experience of working with employment generation programs is preferable, and not mandatory.
Skills and Competencies:
(1) Good written and oral communication skills in English and functional communication in Hindi and Tamil is preferable
(2) Excellent interpersonal skills
(3) Excellent team skills
(4) Willing to travel
COMPENSATION OFFERED
Compensation offered to the selected candidate shall be commensurate with qualifications, experience, and past salary history.
LOCATION
The job requires the person to be on the go; can operate from Coimbatore but should be willing to visit the employment facilities on a regular basis.
Founded in 1983, PRADAN has been at the forefront of innovations in rural development and has played a significant role in the design and implementation improvement of major rural development programmes. Given the deep deprivation in rural pockets, particularly among tribal and vulnerable groups, we promote sustainable livelihoods, integrated with work on issues of Gender, WASH, Health, Nutrition, Climate Change, Skilling and Governance. We currently work across 8 states, reaching out to 2.8 million households in collaboration with more than 100 NGO partners. PRADAN is an equal opportunity organisation. To learn more, please visit us at: www.pradan.net.
As an Executive (Communications), the incumbent is supposed to be a knowledgeable, self-motivated and passionate individual with a creative bent of mind. The major focus area would be to promote and help flourish the practice of reflective writing and process documentation. The role involves content generation, curation, presentation and publication of articles for internal forums and external agencies including mainstream media. The person will also be responsible for organising training events for the same. Creating and implementing the media strategy to showcase PRADAN’s successes and challenges will be another key aspect of the position.
The qualifying degree is a minimum of 16 years of education (A Master’s degree in English literature, or any other social science stream).
A degree or diploma in Mass Communication from a reputed institute is preferred
Nature of Engagement: Regular position with a probation period of six months.
Remuneration: Based on qualification and experience the CTC would be in the range of INR 8 to 10 lakhs per annum. The CTC includes basic pay and other allowances. Apart from this, provision of deferred benefits such as PF, Gratuity, NPS, Insurance (Term life insurance, hospitalization insurance for self and dependents and accident insurance policy) are provided.
Place of posting: In PRADAN locations (possibly district town or state capital)
Only short-listed candidates will be contacted. Those shortlisted will be invited to a selection process in Noida, tentatively in the first week of September 2024.
PRADAN is an equal opportunity employer. Women candidates are encouraged to apply.
Interested candidates with the relevant background and fulfilling the eligibility criteria are visit our website https://www.pradan.net/join-us/#careers and fill the ‘Application for Executive (Communications)’.Applications close by August 31, 2024.