RID POVERTY & HUNGER IN 50 INDIAN TRIBAL VILLAGES

Dancing with the Rains!!

June 1^st used to herald the arrival of the South West Monsoon rains from Kerala. The preparations to either store water, clear the fields, deal with whatever crops that were needed to be harvested would start. Now with changing and unpredictable weather patterns, one is kept on one’s toes.

In the Earth Trust Resource farm at Holabettu, we started to work on clearing up the farm.  The incomplete structure made of rammed earth had to cleared out. The small room with a mud floor and tin walls, had to be redone, the flooring cemented. Though we have a perennial spring, everywhere we are consciously putting in rain water harvesting systems in place. We have to walk the talk. The little room is being referred to as “the Coffee room”!!

Our Coffee Room!!

Meanwhile our women attending our courses carry on eagerly learning and encouraging us to keep conducting our classes on soft skills and on Health Awareness.

It is always a minor tussle between their enthusiastic handling of our sewing machines and the chances of it having a minor breakdown till they learn to handle the treadle!! The women who have passed out receive their certificates and they find jobs or take job work. Economic independence for women is important. One of our teachers wanted her salary to be sent to her husband’s account!!. We had to convince her that it is important for her to have access to her hard-earned money!! So many things we take for granted.

A health demonstration class is in progress. As always, they learn about the various systems of the body. We give importance to health for adolescent girls. We teach their mothers about nutrition.

July brings in more showers. The ladies all return from various holidays. We try and stagger the working hours to accommodate school timings. Our primary concern is the women’s health and nutrition. Whenever Nimmi our Project coordinator for the Women’s programme finishes a particular system of the body, say the digestive system, she encourages the women to create healthy snacks to give to their families. By the end of the Programme, the ladies all have a collection of healthy recipes. The thing is the courses remain largely the same every time, but the participants make a difference.

We started machine Knitting classes also this time as our teachers were keen on passing their skills to a new set of enthusiastic women!

The women still are not proficient in reading knitting and crochet stitch terms and patterns in English. We tried to explain to them, that learning the terms in English would open up infinite possibilities on the internet. They have their own cute definitions.

July.

Meanwhile, in our Resource Farm we harvest our carrots. The ones in the poly houses have not done well, not enough sunlight. We have shifted over to organic seeds which we buy from certified farmer producer co-operatives. Hooga seeds is one, Sahaja another, and Yarroway a third. We tested the soils in all 3 polyhouses. One of them was low in Boron. We are taking suitable action.

Training the field staff to maintain records, is a journey in itself. Hari, our Farm Supervisor has drawn a beautiful scale model of our field and marks current crops etc. He has a good eye. We are including his sketch to honour his effort. So now we have to organize a proper space to aid him!! Our small tiller which had been sitting in a corner has been repaired and is being put to good use. Crop planning, space planning all bring forth a lot of discussions amongst us. The field workers want various inputs. We organize vermicompost and cow dung. Our next project is digging a cow-pat-pit and get it going. Biodynamic farming can be very effective and we are slowly getting there. We’re still not self-sustaining, so we are always grateful to the few donors who believe in us and support us. Every decision about the farm becomes a matter of allotting priority!! Which expense first.

The women’s programme has been carrying on. We always are happy to have visitors come as it affords the women a new angle on life. We had Vidya Sastry of The Crafts Council of India sharing her views, fine tuning their work with them. Thanks to smart phones, most of them are quite well informed.  

August brought Eddy and his sister visiting the women’s programme. Eddy’s sister showed the women how to pat themselves on the back. It was wonderful to see the happiness on their faces.

Vidya Shastry of The Craft Council of India, fine-tuning the women’s work.

AUGUST brought both winds and rains. The women were snug in the classroom. The men and women working in Holabettu farm had to juggle their days between the open fields and the poly houses. The previous harvest is over. The land is being cleared. We get an idea of how well the organic seeds have done.  We are having a lot of discussions on how to manage our second farm at Manaara, Kalibala. It has a resident bison now! We do not have enough resources to revive. So, we are considering various options. Leasing out a small portion is one of them. Stella is an entrepreneur who teaches various small craft pieces to the women. Later on, she places orders. The women learn to organize their time and earn some money.  They organize all this themselves. Earth Trust is just a service provider and knowledge base.  We are ready for what the next three months brings!!

Daily Rhythms

January was cold, but that spells the harvesting, re-sowing planting cycles of so called 'English " vegetables like cauliflower cabbages, carrots, broccoli etc. Earth Trust too is in introspection mode. What next? We kick started the whole Organic movement in the Nilgiris. It took a lot of persistence despite tremendous setbacks to just soldier on. After two decades, our patient passion has paid off. The Organic farmers have formed their own organisation and  handle their own marketing. They are being supported by the State Government Apparatus.  The weekly markets run by them are getting increasingly popular.  Our job as a primary mover is over.

We were able to start work in our resource farm at Holabettu, thanks to the generosity of our few staunch supporters. The three poly-houses are full of vegetables growing, beans carrots and so on. The land outside has been cleared and potatoes and zucchini planted. There is a seasonal rhythm that gently takes over. the artichokes  are blooming and the seeds are setting. We will have a small quantity of completely open-pollinated artichoke seeds. Infrastructure work in the form of repair of existing basic structures is going on.

The women's programme is chugging along its usual course. Our dedicated teachers patiently teach the fresh batch of women. The sewing machines suffer a bit at the hands of novices. We are planning to include machine knitting too. Our Honorary Project Director Nimmi John, in charge of the women's programme teaches them about nutrition and does one-on-on sessions with them advising them on what they should or should not eat. She is on the board of Studies, Providence College for Women Coonoor, for syllabus framing for UG and PG Botany.

In February, The Earth Trust sponsored 2 women farmers to attend the Organic Seed Production Workshop and Roots and Tuber mela ( Festival ) conducted by  Sahaja, a farmer producer Company based in Mysuru. They are very active in seed conservation and exchange. Needless to add, they work only with dedicated Organic farmers. Our 2 lady farmers also carried seeds from their farms for exchange. Organic seeds are going to be the next big challenge. We are also planning to become seed self sufficient eventually. The Earth Trust is a very respected name in Organic farming circles.

In the meanwhile our Women's programme is carrying along very well. Our dedicated staff  transform raw hands into patient and productive ones. Every batch has a natural leader. We try and encourage her qualities.

The garments they stitch and knit and crochet are all sources of fulfillment boosting confidence. They are able to get jobs. We have introduced machine knitting as part of the course. More than all the learning, it is the discovery of companionship in a safe -space that works wonders. They blossom and that is our- Earth Trust's real agenda.

if you were to go through our earlier reports you would find that the activities are the same, the participants are different. At the end of the day, sowing- planting -reaping have  a blessed ordinariness and dependability. And the eager women who join each fresh cycle of soft skill teaching , why they too add to the familiarity of the cycle!!