How NGOs spark The Eureka Moment
During the course of my work, I happen to meet many farmers, environment lovers, and conservationists.
I was once also involved in a community farming project where we checked the soil conditions, understood the art of composting, and tried my hand at growing a few plants too.
The farming project instructor was also doing one experimental project at Ganeshpuri (near Virar, Mumbai). She invited me once there and along the course of the discussion, I came across the NGO Sookhbhoomi.
Sookhbhoomi is a Pune based NGO that works specifically for rural communities in the Indian state of Maharashtra. They train ladies from these areas and help them to spread the knowledge of seed banking, kitchen gardens, health management, and income generation.
This was super impressive. I met one of the Trainers at Sookhbhoomi, Megha.
Megha explained that the village women had some extra time on their hands and how they gradually helped these women realize that they can do wonders with this time.
Beginning with 4 ladies participating in the first kitchen garden project, they grew into a village with 400 Kitchen Gardens ready in 3 years. Isn't it amazing?
These ladies are into rice cultivation, so rice was plenty at home, but other staples like vegetables, dals, meat, etc used to be scarce. These ladies used to consume leftover rice with some salt or masala, causing their health parameters to crash.
Kitchen Gardens helped them to grow their own veggies which could help suffice the entire family including the woman of the house.
Gradually, their health parameters improved and felt more confident in the venture. They soon incorporated a barter system for their vegetables into the neighborhood. The next step was even more interesting. Ladies soon realized that they had extra vegetables, and thus they started selling them in the local markets. And.. they started earning too!
Behind every successful woman is a tribe of other successful women who have her back - anonymous
Such an enriching experience is a treasure to hold :)
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