One of the most important means of improving the livelihood base of tribal communities is to increase the income they can derive on sustainable basis from non-timber forest produce, also called NTFP and minor forest produce. Unfortunately, however, generally the collectors of minor forest produce, which often include a significant number of women, are not able to get a fair price while traders at various levels manage to earn high profit margins.
Various efforts have been made over the years to improve this situation, and an ongoing effort in parts of Pali and Udaipur districts, in Rajasthan, has brought a lot of hope to hundreds of tribal community (Garasia) households here.
This effort is centered around the activities of Ghoomar Mahila Producer Company Ltd. which has about 2000 women shareholders and hopes to increase this number significantly in the near future. Its work is based on several local fruits including custard apple (sitafal), blackberries (jamun) and berries (ber). There is potential for adding several other forest based produce. As many community members have orchards, fruits grown using natural methods can also be added to forest-based fruits and produce. The products already introduced include custard apple pulp (used by natural ice cream makers and others), blackberry slices and cold drink, selected berries and berry based products including sweets (laddus) and lollypop type sticks with berry paste. All the food products promoted by these venture are healthy food products. Non-food products include natural colors derived from Palash tree flowers and other vegetation, and leaf plates and cups, again based on Palash tree.
Hence Ghoomar provides healthy products in ways that promote sustainable livelihoods of weaker sections and women, and this is strong reason for supporting this.
Jitendra Kumar Meena, CEO of Ghoomar Mahila Producer Company, has been involved in this venture and the preparations preceding this for years. As he explains, the efforts in this direction were initially guided by SRIJAN voluntary organization and then at a certain stage the women farmers and forest produce collectors could take up the wider responsibilities on their own.
This initiative has helped women from tribal communities to increase their income significantly. Several women to whom I spoke in Bheemna ( Bali block) stated that their income derived from minor forest produce in the last year has been somewhere between Rs. 25,000 to Rs. 80,000, which is a significant increase. For Dharmi Bai the increase has been to about Rs. 79,000 in the previous year from about Rs. 5,000 a few years back. An annual income of about Rs. 50,000 is reported by quite a few women.
This increase is based on three aspects of the changing situation. Firstly, from the very beginning Ghoomar started paying a higher rate for collecting forest produce like custard apples. Secondly, as processing and value adding activities were taken up, the capacity of the company to pay a higher rate also increased. Thirdly, there were increasing opportunities for employment in processing activities, helped by training arranged for taking up this work even in decentralized, village based units with hygiene and related care.
The increased income is certainly well-deserved as women often have to work quite hard, climbing hills to gather some of the produce.
As several of the women share-holders are also members of self-help groups, they have additional capacity to set up small enterprises based on forest produce on their own too, which can in turn can also have linkages with the main producer company. Sani Bai, a member from Roshni group was helped recently to sell her produce directly to consumers.
Apart from income increase, another important aspect relates to sustainability of these livelihoods. As a company dedicated to sustainable livelihoods which can only be based on careful harvesting, Ghoomar and its members are committed to following careful practices to avoid any harm to plants and trees and any wastage of fruit. Unfortunately, as several local people complain, agents from Delhi and other big markets, are only interested in quickly maximizing their earnings in the short-term so that they ask those hired by them to collect very quickly what they can and this leads to indiscriminate harvesting. The trees are harmed, the collecting season can be reduced, and a lot of fruit plucked pre-maturely is wasted.
Therefore the government should encourage ventures like Ghoomar which have a commitment to sustainable livelihoods based on careful harvesting. In fact, as a community based local organization, Ghoomar is also deeply interested in protecting forests so that fruit availability can also continue at present levels or can increase further (they are more likely to spread seeds or seed-balls after processing fruit, while outsider agents simply move away fast). It is also helped by the fact that local tribal women who are its members are already well aware of the requirements of careful harvesting and can be further sensitized regard this in the frequent trainings and meetings they attend.
Ghoomar is planning to take up a plantation of Moringa trees so that it would be adding drumstick based products soon. However its main strength should be in local forest produce where risks are lower and sustainability prospects are higher.
A lot of the future expansion of this project is in Udaipur district and hence the two areas together can add to diversity of products.
The biggest strength of the project is in community based strengths derived from a relationship of trust that has been created over several years. The federation of self-help groups and the farmer producer company can add greatly to the strengths of each other and as the CEO of the company Jitendra Meena and the CEO of the federation Saddam Husain Chisti have been working in close cooperation, prospects of such convergence have increased further. Both its social relevance and its various strengths point to improving prospects and growing membership base, so that there are hopes of this effort becoming an inspiring model of combining sustainability and environment care with increasing livelihood prospects of tribal community and availability of healthy food for people generally.
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The writer is Honorary Convener, Campaign to Save Earth Now. His recent books include Man over Machine, Protecting Earth for Children, and Navjivan
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