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Collectivising Farmers Into Producer Organisations A s elsewhere in the developing world, in India too, small farmers’ livelihoods are being threatened due to accelerating climate change impacts and liberalisation and privatisation of Indian agriculture. As per the Agricultural Census, 2011, the marginal and small farm holdings with individual operational land holding accounted for a whopping 85% of the total farm holdings in India in 2010-11. Entire dependency on monsoon and with inadequate access to inputs like quality seeds, fertilizers, irrigation water, improved technologies, information and credit; these small farmers have been shoved up into a hugely disabling and non-viable ecosystem with limited access to markets and reduced profit margins. Collectivisation of these small and marginal farmers into producer organisations has emerged as one of the most effective pathways to address the challenges of climate change and it has improved access to investments, technology, inputs and markets. The term ‘producer’ has been used rather than ‘farmer’ because it covers all aspects of agricultural production including livestock and fisheries and the processing of agricultural products also.
The Bundelkhand region in Central India is known for its abundance of naturalresources but today it is one of the poorest and most backward regions of the country. Since the last seven years, Bundelkhand is struck by the occurrence of regular drought conditions and scarcity of water which has slowed down the course of development and growth as agriculture is the main livelihood of people living in the area. In addition to this because of the lack of technology penetration and access to inputs and services, limited investment capacity and immense burden of debt, the farmers of Bundelkhand are in a situation of severe crisis, where they are continuously struggling to survive. In this context, an integrated set of interventions is required to overcome the consequences of dilapidation. The promotion of Farmer Producer Organisations (FPO) in Bundelkhand is one of the most important initiatives taken up by the Development Alternatives (DA) Group with support of NABARD. DA has been providing support to a variety of producer organisations in the form of agriculture seeds and technology, vegetable cultivation and dairy farming in different domains and geographies. It is thus helping to transform community based organisations and producer organisations into sustainable business institutions. Approach: Sound Application of Business Development
The FPO model has a 3-tier methodology which is based on incubation, implementation and influence stages. A Better Economic Deal for Farmers The viability of the FPO as a business model has been tested. The outcome of establishing Producer Organisations will be enhanced producers’ incomes as a result of increase in production. It will also present solutions for sustainable food production systems and regeneration of local ecosystems which will be in sync with the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 2: End hunger, achieve food security and improve nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture. Way Forward The various set of services provided by FPOs will be covering almost all aspects of backward and forward linkages which will include inputs, technical services to processing and marketing. Development Alternatives looks forward to even greater collaboration in the future on systems that drive large scale change, particularly in terms of how critically needed investment from pools of capital can be drawn into disaggregated business models, along with required changes in the policy environment. q Mohua Tripathi Omkar Gupta
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