Struggle behind tasting flowery
results
Kovel Foundation is a Trust by the Indigenous
People
for
Research
on
Sustainable
Technologies, with its headquarters at
Visakhapatnam. The organization is striving
towards addressing the issues related to
livelihoods of the forest dwelling tribal
community by looking at the issues related to
conservation and regeneration of forest and
empowering the community towards realizing
the entitlements that are meant for them.
Collection of Kalmegh from the Forest
With the experience of working with the tribal community for the past two decades
Kovel Foundation is able to identify the areas which require utmost attention to deal
with the issues related to economic, food and health security and is able to converge
and mobilize resources to deal with the issues related to the mentioned areas which
needs to be secured in favour of the tribal community from Mahila Kisan
Sashaktikaran Pariyojana of Ministry of Rural Development and Society for
Elimination of Rural Poverty. The project is being implemented in 5 districts of
Andhra Pradesh namely Visakhapatnam, East Godavari, Kurnool, Khammam and
Chithoor covering 11, 000 tribal Mahila Kisan who are dependents on NTFP &
MAPS collection.
The endeavour intervenes on the key areas which are mentioned below in order to
ensure economic, food and health security:
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Promotion and strengthening of community institutions with producers as
main stakeholders
Establishment of decentralized supply chain for effective procurement,
processing and marketing of tribal produce (APs/MAPs)
Establishment of institutional support system for delivery of technical,
marketing and information services to proposed decentralized supply chain,
controlled and managed by producer organisations
Strengthening of primary production base of agriculture, horticulture,
medicinal plants and NTFPs
Revitalizing herbal based traditional health care system and
Convergence and Capacity building
The project is also aiming towards improving the income of each Mahila Kisan by at
least Rs 27, 000/- per annum as additional to what the family is getting jnow and the
strategy of empowerment of tribal women which is based on supply chain
management and looks at NTFP/MAPs sector as whole rather than microcosmic
approach of intervention.
As part of its work Kovel
Foundation, is encouraging
the target beneficiaries to
tap the untapped forest
produce which are having
great market by facilitating Drying of Kalmegh
them in to producer groups
and ensuring that the community will take care of
Processing of Kalmegh
conservation related measures while collecting such
species. One such commodity identified is Kalmegh. Nearly 8000 Mahila Kisans
have got benefited under this intervention and the case study speaks the flowery
results of the effort and struggles that are behind the success of the intervention.
Kalmegh is one of the species of forest that is available abundant in the Agency areas
of coastal Andhra and is having high demand in the market of NTFP/MAPS. The
commodity had been collected by the community in the olden days since the traders
are offering only 5 rupees a KG the community had slowly withdrawn from the
collection of the same as the price and drudgery involved in the whole process of the
collection and processing of the same are a mismatch.
Kovel Foundation has done a clear study of the value chain of the commodity as part
of its action research and identified that the commodity has highly potential market
both in terms of quantity of the produce and price being offered to the same.
During the time of action research only the organization has motivated the
community to form into common interest groups and to collect & market the forest
produces and kept special focus on Kalmegh.
In this intervention Kovel Foundation has organized the forest dependent tribal
women into Primary Producer Groups at village level and federated them at cluster
and district levels.
The organization has imparted training to all the 8000 Mahila Kisan on the technical
aspects related conservation, collection and processing of the Kalmegh and as a
result of the same the Mahila Kisans have collected nearly 60 tons of Kalmegh.
Since promotion of Producer Company has been the key task and aim of Kovel
Foundation, the organization has initiated the efforts in those lines and facilitated the
Primary Production Units (PPU) and Primary Procurement and Supply Groups
(PPSG) at various levels and encouraged the purchase of the Kalmegh from the
Mahila Kisans. The PPUs have purchased kalmegh @ 20 per kg from Mahila Kisan.
The material purchased has been marketed to the Natural Remedies Private Limited
(NRPL). While getting tie-ups with companies also Kovel Foundation is encouraging
the community to take care of the following parameters:
1. Keeping the commitment for long term association (It should not be one time
tie up)
2. Quality control and product specifications
3. Promptness in the payments and other procedure.
4. Price offered for the produce in comparison with the market.
With the efforts, around 4000 Mahila Kisans involved in the activity are able to
realize 34,020,000/- (Thirty four lakhs twenty thousand). Looking at the drudgery
aspects involved in the whole process the organization has established a solar drying
unit and a Kalmegh chopping machine at Chinthapaka village of Visakhapatnam
district on pilot basis and the same will be reducing the drudgery related to cutting
and drying of the produce. Nearly 100 women are getting benefited out of the unit
established.
Plan Ahead:
1. Kovel Foundation is actively engaging with the National Biodiversity
Authority and State biodiversity Board in the process of facilitation of
Biodiversity Management Committees (BMC). The grounding of the BMC
will help, ease and address the bottlenecks in the marketing of NTFP/MAPS.
2. The organization is having a series of dialogues with forest and GCC
authorities for required support.
3. Since the capacity building of the institutions has been a key challenge, the
organization is really keeping its efforts towards capacitating the institutions
towards handling a producer company of their own.
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