Bolstering Rural Economy and Addressing COVID Exigencies (BRACE)

Bolstering Rural Economy and Addressing COVID Exigencies (BRACE)

We are happy to announce our partnership with British Asian Trust to help stabilise the livelihoods of the most marginalised rural population, especially women, through project Bolstering Rural economy and Addressing COVID Exigencies (BRACE). BRACE will provide project resources directly to 3,000 women farmers from as many families, and women agri-entrepreneurs, across three eastern states of the country – Odisha, Jharkhand and West Bengal. The COVID-19 second wave has caused immense damage across rural India including the loss of livelihoods for many, especially small & marginal farm (SMF) holders. Earning remunerative prices by selling crops has become a stiff challenge for the SMFs as local haats and mandis are still not fully functional. As a result, they are running low on food stock and there is a huge erosion of whatever meagre savings they had. Therefore, there is an urgent need to recapitalize and reboot the rural economy. Through project BRACE, we visualize a multi-pronged approach to create growth clusters across the rural countryside for rural economy revival.

Project BRACE would be implemented across 12 blocks in the three states. The initiative will look to create small local growth clusters, say two to three contiguous districts forming such a cluster. The aim is to create self-reliant systems of production, processing and marketing that can support livelihoods/employment for 3,000 households, and promote 24 Agriculture Entrepreneurs across these blocks. Our team of professionals will work in partnership with a network of SHG institutions and their leaders, community cadres, economic institutions like the FPOs and their staff and leaders besides government officials and other stakeholders like market actors, technology and finance providers to create the opportunities over a period of six months.

We take this opportunity to express our gratitude to the British Asian Trust for supporting our initiatives to re-boot rural economy and help marginalised women farmers combat COVID-19 economic aftermath.