A compilation of Ecologically Sensible Good Practices
Imprints of Ecological Footprints ‌. A compilation of Ecologically Sensible Good Practices Aug 2016 Authors: MV Rama Chandrudu Beneta Mahanta Waseem Mohammad Anitha Reddy V MB Vali Saab Editors: K Suresh MV Rama Chandrudu Visuals:Cheriyal Nakashi Artists Family - Shri D Vaikuntam and his family members Mrs. D Vanaja (wife); D Vinay and D Rakesh (sons). Design and Layout : Ankush Copy Left : These case studies could be used for non-commercial use, with proper acknowledgement. Supported by : Indian Foundation for Humanistic Development, Bengaluru Produced by : WASSAN (Watershed Support Services and Activities Network) Produced for Leaders For Nature Program. This program is collectively organized by CII; Hivos; IUCN; Wild Life Trust of India. IFHD is anchoring the Leaders for Nature Program. Published by: IFHD, Bengaluru
Acknowledgements I am very happy to present "Imprints of Ecological Footprints ‌. A compilation of Ecologically Sensible Good Practices". I take this opportunity to thank all organizations and individuals who contributed to the process of documenting these good practices. They were kind to frankly share with us their experiences, thoughts, challenges and achievements. They also shared relevant data to substantiate any critical point from their experiences. Some of them even prepared the first drafts of these case studies. They also revised them, based on our feedback. All the organizations/ individuals happily gave consent for publishing these case studies and using them for learning purposes under "Leaders for Nature" program of IFHD, IUCN, CII, Hivos and Wild Life Trust of India. The entire process of producing this compilation was an enriching and fruitful experience. It is also a humbling experience for us to learn several lessons from these interactions and visits to several villages/ sites. We genuinely believe that this compilation truly enriches the learning processes of "Leaders for Nature" program. The Writeshop was one of the important events of this process. We got guidance and feedback on the '0' drafts from the participants of the writeshop. This was useful in refining the initial drafts. The participants of writeshop also made important suggestions on the presentation and utility of these case studies. From their busy schedules, they spared few days for refining these case studies, which is a very kind gesture. I thank everyone who participated in the writeshop. Their inputs are invaluable. I thank Ms. Aruna Rangachar Pohl, IFHD for having faith in WASSAN and entrusting us the responsibility of compiling these case studies. She is an active team member at all critical stages of the project and guided us on choice of case studies, structure/ framework, presentation, etc. The partnership with IFHD is really cherished by all of us, at WASSAN.
I also thank the family of artists of Cheriyal - Shri D Vaikuntam, Mrs D Vanaja, Mr D Vinay and D Rakesh, who visualized these experiences in their own unique style. My team -MB Vali, Anitha Vustela, Waseem Mohammad, Benita Mahanta, Radhashree who spent considerable time on this agenda. I also thank K Suresh for providing editorial inputs and support at various stages of this process. MV Rama Chandrudu WASSAN Aug 2016
Foreword It is almost three decades back, the threats to "Our Common Future" were formally identified and deliberations started gaining more steam and support from governments too‌ (Our Common Future,Gro Harlem Brundtland, 1987). Climate Change and its implications were also slowly getting recognized during this period. The need for "producing more with less" was also part of this thinking process, as a means to address the challenges of the future. Over a period of time, the world witnessed more economic distress, unemployment, political turmoil and ecological disasters across different countries and regions of world. Those early predictions seemed to be less threatening than the current reality. The global gloom got predictable companions - unscrupulous industrial growth, irresponsible urbanization, careless global politics, dishonest governments, self-centric citizenship, which tried to glorify the current trends as achievements and inevitable solutions. In the middle of such despair and misery, there is a hope. "Imprints of Ecological Footprints - A Compilation of Ecologically Sensible Good Practices" is a compendium of good practices that brings the efforts made by relentless civil society organizations, citizens and community based organizations, to change the direction of this trend. These experiences bring cheer and hope in the lives of thousands of rural, tribal and urban citizens in India, who are part of these experiences. They were able to take a different path that is less travelled and troublesome. There were several challenges, at each step and milestone. But they continued their journey and proved that "producing more with less" is possible. They also ensured that the ecological and environmentally sustainable processes are feasible for improving economic standards and quality of life of poor communities. These case studies give a hope and confidence that we can face the cruel world and transform the same into a comfortable place for all - including endangered species, poor and marginalized communities. While Corporate Social Responsibility is gaining more support
from governments, corporate agencies and development agencies, these experiences provide guidance and help them to think about alternatives. These experiences help the willing and discerning development agencies and investors in social change, to transcend the mundane "photo stories" of majority of current CSR interventions. They provide an array of options, strategies and ideas that proved themselves in different parts of the country. I thank all the organizations and agencies who shared their stories - highs and lows of it, with us frankly and completely. I thank them for providing leadership on the chosen theme - promoting biodiversity; conservation and governance of natural resources; promoting ecologically sensitive production processes; enhancing livelihoods by developing environmentally harmonious economic models and several others. These experiences are invaluable and are certainly useful for provoking thoughts in the minds of participants of "Leaders for Nature" programs, which are jointly organized by IFHD, IUCN, CII, Wild Life Trust of India, HIVOS and other like-minded organizations. I thank WASSAN for producing this compilation of case studies and supporting us in this endeavor.
Aruna Rangachar Pohl IFHD, Bengaluru Aug 2016
16 Teach them how to fish….
"
Since 2013, we are able to celebrate village festival with enthusiasm and there is much fun and merry… We have wonderful time on this day… And why not? We have financial resources to celebrate the festival with gaiety… Thanks to fisheries business of our women selfhelp groups, the village corpus is richer. The women SHGs pay annually Rs 25,000 to this fund…" Mr Kalia Sahu narrates happily… As the headman of the Bara Village, Kartanpalli Panchayat, he is proud that the villagers appreciate the festival celebrations every year. The Grama Panchayat is also able to provide some basic services and facilities in the village, without depending on the government. "We love eating fish… We leased in the village water ponds and started fish rearing following scientific methods…. With an investment of Rs 5000, within 9 months we could get fish worth Rs 18000. It is a good business. We sell fish only after ensuring that we have enough for our home…" asserts Ms Kalki Lakshmi, a beaming leader of Ma Ladrimata Self Help Group from the Bara village. Like Bara, there are 123 villages in Malkangiri district, Odisha which are celebrating village festivals since 2013 with more pomp. These tribal Teach them how to fish….
179
180
Imprints of Ecological Footprints …
habitations could not believe that the calm and serene water bodies of their village could also spin significant profits. Sounds very fishy? Let's catch the fish and the story behind this‌. During 2012-13, three women Self Help Groups of Bara village - Ma Ladrimata SHG, Buruadei SHG and Jagakalia SHG came together to take up fish rearing in the village community pond. They jointly paid for the cost of fingerlings and all the required inputs. The responsibilities of feeding, cleaning and watch & ward were distributed among the members of these three groups. They got timely support and guidance from Raju Kalia, a community resource person of their village. They stocked 4000 fingerlings in August 2013. They followed scientific methods of fish rearing (like feeding, monitoring growth, etc). After 9 months, in April 2014, they got a delightful catch of 1.82 quintals of fish. For an investment of approximately Rs 5,000 (primarily fingerling and feed cost) the SHGs earned Rs 18,200. Based on this experience and enthusiasm of these groups, Fisheries Department, Government of Odisha gave a grant of Rs 5,000 to each SHG in 2014. These women planned to use the fund for converting the community pond into fish nursery for the next season. This was again a new venture for them. This time, apart from rearing fish, they wanted to sell fingerlings for the other water bodies in the district. While the tribal hamlets were celebrating festivals and additional income, the members of Revitalizing Rainfed Agriculture (RRA) Network were planning the next steps. Tribal hamlets in Malkangiri district, Odisha have abundant natural resources including forest, water bodies, streams, livestock and fertile lands. All these resources are not used by local tribal Teach them how to fish‌.
181
communities in an optimum manner. On the other hand, non-local/ nontribal entrepreneurs tend to exploit these opportunities, often at the cost of local tribal communities. Fisheries is one such sector. The Bengali communities rehabilitated in the district from Bangladesh have expertise in fisheries and were able to earn good income from this occupation. They were the main players in production, rearing and marketing of fish. Local tribals do not have the necessary knowledge and skills. They are dependent on the Bengali communities for fingerlings and other aspects; and were often cheated. Small rainfed water bodies have multiple purposes - agriculture, drinking water, fisheries, etc. Fisheries is generally considered to be profitable only in perennial, big water bodies. Owing to the innate complexity of fish production and related value chain development, the small water bodies were largely neglected and their potential remained underused. RRA Network decided to change this situation in Malkangiri district and designed a program to ensure better livelihood opportunities for the local tribal communities by harnessing local water bodies (tanks, ponds) for fish production. The programme aimed at introducing simple, low cost technical and scientific know-how among the farmers, while keeping their traditional good practices intact. Following this, several resources (financial, technical, knowledge) were converged at the pond level. Existing Government schemes/ programs were harnessed in support of this initiative. The District Collector, Malkangiri nominated Integrated Tribal Development Agency 182
Imprints of Ecological Footprints ‌
183
(ITDA) as the coordinating agency for this initiative. Several schemes of the ITDA (related to agriculture; horticulture; housing, etc) were channelled to this initiative. RRA network organized series of meetings and discussions on this agenda in each village with the villagers, grama panchayats and women Self Help Groups. During this process, RRA Network realized the need for a "community resource person" (CRP). They were chosen by partner NGOs at field level, and were finalised by Department of Fisheries, based on criteria like reading, writing ability and level of interest in fish farming. The local youth selected as the CRPs, in course of time, became experts on fisheries. They offer variety of services such as motivating farmers; forming farmer's producers groups, guiding them on various aspects of fish production like feeding, protection, monitoring the growth of fish, harvesting techniques, etc. These local experts and scientists are easily accessible to farmers. RRA Network paid them as per the tasks performed. RRA Network formed Farmer Producer Groups (FPG) at the village level. A typical FPG would have 12 members with a president and secretary. These FPGs will receive material and/ or technical inputs and steer the process at the village level. RRA Network envisions strengthening these groups into Farmers Producers Organization in due course of time. Several training programs, exposure visits and workshops were organized for the members of Farmers Producers Groups and Community Resource Persons with the help of experts from WASSAN, Fisheries Department and Integrated Tribal Development Agency (ITDA), Government of Odisha and CIFA. 184
Imprints of Ecological Footprints ‌
185
Each FPG developed action plans for its water body. As part of their plan, the members of FPG collected money to purchase fingerlings. First year, the FPGs purchased fingerlings from Andhra Pradesh (Bhimavaram). However, RRA Network was able to convince ITDA to provide financial assistance/ grant to these groups for purchase of the fingerlings/ other needs of the initiative. ITDA agreed to finance the entire project. Though ITDA was providing all the inputs (fingerlings, nets, feed, etc), farmers decided to collect equivalent of money from the members and this amount was deposited in their bank account as corpus fund. As several ponds were covered in this initiative, they needed 15 Lakh fingerlings for the program to take off. Neither the government hatchery nor the local private hatcheries were able to supply these fingerlings. So FPGs procured the fingerlings from a private hatchery in Naitati, West Bengal. An ITDA approved local hatchery procured fingerlings from this place and eventually supplied to the FPGs in the district. During 2012-13, a total of 215000 fingerlings were supplied to 197 ponds in 26 panchayats. As there was shortage of fingerlings, RRA Network supplied "yearlings" (a fingerling with one year of age and big in size) to farmers, in consultation with ITDA, Department of Fisheries, CIFA. As farmers were not familiar with this, they were apprehensive about the survival of yearlings in their ponds. Secondly, the cost of yearlings would be more than fingerlings (Rs. 8 compared to Rs 1) It was important for the network to understand their perspective and let them decide; hence both options of fingerlings and yearlings were kept open. 186
Imprints of Ecological Footprints ‌
Fisheries in Rainfed Water Bodies in Malkangiri District, Odisha S No
Item
2012-13
2013-14
2014-15
1
Ponds Covered, No
197
812
1238
2
Villages Covered, No
26
219
222
3
Farmers Covered, No
235
1039
1553
4
Farmers Producers Groups, No
0
62
106
5
Funds Mobilized from Farmers, Rs
200000
700000
800000
6
Funds Mobilized from Government, Rs
0
1187000
240000
7
Fingerlings Supplied, No
215000
847150
1039150
8
Yearlings Supplied, No
0
0
45190
9
Production, Kg
1061250
4245000
13733290
RRA Network promoted better feeding practices, which would result in higher productivity. However, the network ensured that cost of feed is not very high and it is made with locally available material. Several experiments were conducted to ensure that nutritious feed is available without increasing the cost. Use of chatua powder (husk of Gram, Ground nut) as feed was one such innovation. SHGs were making this chatua and supplying to local Anganwadis. Villagers procured leftover chatua powder at minimal rates from SHGs members and used it as fish feed. ITDA also provided assistance to these farmers by supplying groundnut cake, mustard oil cake and rice polish in suitable quantities. The total worth of feed was Rs 2.9 Lakhs in 2012. Teach them how to fish‌.
187
Three types of nets have been supplied to each group, keeping in mind the requirement during different seasons - 5 plankton nets (for checking plankton growth in the pond), 3 cast nets (for netting to monitor growth and condition of fish throughout the season), 1 fry drag net (for harvesting at the end). The total cost of these nets supplied by ITDA is Rs. 9,00,000. Each group charges minimum user fees from each farmer with terms and conditions for usage of these nets. These protocols have been stabilized over the years. The tribals realized the potential of water bodies and their multiple uses for enhancing their livelihoods - fish is an important part of this‌ Starting with 197 ponds in 2012, RRA Network has covered 1238 ponds by 2015.
Aashima Chowdhary and Dinesh Balam, WASSAN Edited by: MV Rama Chandrudu
188
Imprints of Ecological Footprints ‌
237
About Cheriyal Paintings Shri D Vaikuntam and his family members Mrs. D Vanaja (wife); D Vinay and D Rakesh (sons) are keeping the tradition of Cheriyal Paintings of Telangana state, for generations. All members of the family are engaged in protecting and conserving this rare art form, that is not likely to survive for long. This is the only family in the country that is still engaged in this traditional art form. The Cheriyal Art has a unique character - red color background; vivid presentation of figures (men, women, animals, flowers, plants and others) with unique strokes and style. This art form belongs to "nakashi" form of paintings in India. But Cheriyal paintings contextualized this nakashi format to local Telangana and improvised it, with their unique styles. Apart from paintings and scrolls, Cheriyal Masks are also very attractive and unique with their bright colors and large eyes. D Vaikuntam received several awards from Central/ State governments, for his unique contribution to Cheriyal Art. D Vaikuntam and his family members agreed to present the key messages of these case studies. They spent time with us to understand the essence of each case study and presented it in their own style. These pictures further enriched the experiences, which are already exemplary in several ways. WASSAN thanks the family of artists of Cheriyal for their support in visualising these case studies. Pictures of some of the paintings/ scrolls and masks could be seen on this blog: http://vaikuntamnakash.blogspot.in/
254
Imprints of Ecological Footprints ‌
"…..In the middle of such despair and misery, there is a hope. "Imprints of Ecological Footprints - A Compilation of Ecologically Sensible Good Practices" is a compendium of good practices that brings the efforts made by relentless civil society organizations, citizens and community based organizations, to change the direction of the trend. These experiences brought cheer and hope in the lives of thousands of rural, tribal and urban citizens in India, who are part of these experiences. They took a different path that is less travelled and troublesome. There were several challenges, at each step and milestone. But they continued their journey and proved that "producing more with less" is possible. They also ensured that the ecological and environmentally sustainable processes are feasible for improving economic standards and quality of life of poor communities…"Aruna Rangachar Pohl, IFHD, Bangaluru. "……these experiences are invaluable and are certainly useful for provoking thoughts in the minds of participants of "Leaders for Nature" programs, which is organized by IFHD, IUCN, CII, Wild Life Trust of India, HIVOS and other likeminded organizations.The entire process of producing this compilation was an enriching and fruitful experience. It is a humbling experience for us to learn lessons from the interactions and visits to their villages/ sites. We genuinely believe that this compilation truly enriches the learning processes of "Leaders for Nature" program" - MV Rama Chandrudu, WASSAN