-Anindita Das
“Siju, one of the most neglected districts of Meghalaya, is cut off from the big town, as the nearest town is about 8 hours from there. With bad roads, poor communication and neglected by the government, Siju had a lot of scope for social activities. One of the major reasons to choose the place is it a coal belt, where illegal coal mining is carried on, damaging the environment,” says Jemimah Marak, Head of Programmes with Anant Foundation for Innovation and Social Inclusion (AFISI). AFISI, founded in 2017 by Retd Major Ajit Singh, is focused on social innovations to ensure an inclusive growth in a progressive society. The multi-dimensional process facilitates full and active participation of every member of the society in all aspects of life, including civic, social, economic, and political activities, as well as participation in decision-making processes. Anant Foundation was started to explore innovative ideas, implementing and testing them and coming up with out-of-the-box solutions to challenge the common narrative. AFISI looks at a positive framework change with a long, sustainable, and transformative impact on society. Since its incorporation in 2016 AFISI has been engaged in multiple activities to promote education and livelihoods amongst its focus group. AFISI believes that a true empowerment of individuals in the community can only be achieved through quality education, imparting vocational skills and facilitating meaningful livelihoods both in the formal and informal sectors.
Jemimah, who is a trained teacher and a counseling psychologist, has over 12 years experience of working with children. The founder of The 100 Story House, a children’s library in Tura, Meghalaya, she had been the consultant Education Specialist for an ADB (Asian Development Bank) project that focused on Education and Livelihood in the state, during which period she was able to tour the length and breadth of Meghalaya, connecting with communities and schools.
She is one of the key drivers of the Livelihood Promotion Centre (LPC) project, Meghalaya and subsequently the A-bani initiative, networking with the local farmers from across the state. Siju, she discovered, has a lot of potential in terms of farming, as the land is very fertile. When Jemimah visited the place for the first time, there was no electricity for thirteen months. They procured vegetables from outside despite having a lot of potentials to sustain with their own means. What they required was proper guidance. The children were engaged in coal mining, with education taking a back seat, as the teachers to are not willing to go to the place. Spreading awareness was necessary to make them alert of the value of organic fruits and vegetables, as they were being exploited by the traders who bought the products such as cashew nuts and jackfruits in a very low price. AFISI wishes to intervene by setting up a livelihood center to train the farmers in knowing the machinery and the use of modern techniques and processing units etc. and to make their products marketed under the brand Abani. They are also going to explore eco-friendly packaging for all their produces. This will create additional livelihoods. From organic produce to organic packaging, A-bani hopes to impact the lives of many, especially in rural communities.
It is with Siju that the LPC project started, with the view to expand further to other parts of the state. This would entail multiple activities involving food processing, agro-processing, and market linkage, etc. Nevertheless, due to the situation created by the outbreak of COVID, the entire enterprise came to halt, and as per the request of the farmer community across the state of Meghalaya, AFISI now has to help them out to deal with the unprecedented crisis by supporting them in selling their produces, and thus it is at present concentrating on marketing. What A-bani does under its initiative is to offer them prices higher than the middlemen rates pre COVID. This serves two immediate purposes: farmers gets fair price for the produce and they are not exploited by the middlemen during the COVID crisis.
A network of farmers has been created with the help of volunteers from the community who go to the farmers and help AFISI to identify produces for sale. They are in the process of sending their first order of jackfruit, pineapple, wild forest honey, ginger and turmeric. All the produces are organic. After AFISI’s intervention, farmers from West Garo Hills not only sold their produce in Chennai but also supported specially-abled ex-servicemen from the armed forces in Tamil Nadu for their agro-processing venture. Recently, around 35 farmer families in West Garo Hills were able to earn at least 30% more income for their produce compared to what they were getting in the local markets or through the middlemen. The farmers have gradually started learning a few skills to compete in the National Markets like packaging, grading and other quality parameters. The awareness about the overall objective of the project has united the farmer community in supporting the project. These are the initial stages of the project and AFISI aims to achieve much more once they scale up the project into the agro-processing too. However, COVID has disrupted the process, but it is a temporary phase, which will pass soon. Thus, AFlSI looks forward to create meaningful livelihood opportunities in the state of Meghalaya in the days ahead, taking up one community at a time.
This serves two immediate purposes: farmers gets fair price for the produce and they are not exploited by the middlemen during the COVID crisis. A network of farmers has been created with the help of volunteers from the community who go to the farmers and help AFISI to identify produces for sale. They are in the process of sending their first order of jackfruit, pineapple, wild forest honey, ginger and turmeric. All the produces are organic. After AFISI’s intervention, farmers from West Garo Hills not only sold their produce in Chennai but also supported specially-abled ex-servicemen from the armed forces in Tamil Nadu for their agro-processing venture. Recently, around 35 farmer families in West Garo Hills were able to earn at least 30% more income for their produce compared to what they were getting in the local markets or through the middlemen.
The farmers have gradually started learning a few skills to compete in the National Markets like packaging, grading and other quality parameters. The awareness about the overall objective of the project has united the farmer community in supporting the project. These are the initial stages of the project and AFISI aims to achieve much more once they scale up the project into the agro-processing too. However, COVID has disrupted the process, but it is a temporary phase, which will pass soon. Thus, AFlSI looks forward to create meaningful livelihood opportunities in the state of Meghalaya in the days ahead, taking up one community at a time.
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