Existing Solutions

Water Harvesting, Rain water, Food Security, decentralized

technical

Political

Decentralized Small Scale Surface and Structure as a Viable Agriculture Water Management Solution for Optimal use of Rain water for Food Security of Small & Marginal Tribal Farmers in Backward Tribal Region prone to the Menace of Naxalism: The model offers an Integrated Agriculture Solution with Infrastructural Support for Sustainable Livelihoods.

Mandla, a tribal dominated district is located in the hilly and forest areas of Maikal hill range of the Satpuras, in mostly scattered habitation. The tribes have a definite way of life style and social-cultural and religious characteristics. In the past majority of these tribes used to depend upon forest wealth for their livelihood but today the traditional access of tribals to the forests is restricted and it has had an adverse effect on the tribal life style. With an almost complete ban on hunting, many tribes have been deprived of their precious protein diet. Collection of minor forest produces barely lasts for about 50 day’s employment in a year. It hardly contributes one-tenth of a tribal household income. A large majority of tribals are associated with agricultural activities but their agricultural fields are undulating, and smallholdings are subjected to severe soil erosion. Due to their marginal and uneconomical holdings, earnings from these pursuits do not give them reasonable level of living.

With this background in mind Mr KK Khare, an IAS officer of 1997 batch joined as Collector, Mandla in March, 2009. His prior experience as Collector Anuppur between January 2006 and March 2009 had given him enough insight to work for the resource rich poor’s of the tribal region of Madhya Pradesh, as both the districts come under the Scheduled Area and are on the fringes of naxal dominated forests of Chhattisgarh. He had also seen and experienced the power of MGNAREGA as a tool of empowerment of the poor and down trodden. It has the potential of not only providing assured wage employment but also in creation of sustainable livelihood assets. He was convinced that despite the fact that agricultural development synonym with irrigation but construction of dam is not feasible everywhere, especially in the context of Mandla.

The district is deficient in secondary sector; there is no major irrigation project that may influence the agriculture development of the area, with the result the tribals are totally dependent on dilapidated status of agriculture or on wage earnings from plethora of government schemes being implemented in the district. However, it was also clear in his mind that sound strategy shall have to be formulated to enhance the income level of such vulnerable communities, by optimum utilization of available resources. After long deliberations with the district officers, it was perceived that solution lies in making agriculture a profitable occupation without increasing cost of cultivation. It was, therefore, decided to utilise maximum resources of MGNREGS to extend the area under cultivation, adopting various land reform measures, developing water conservation techniques, enhancing soil fertility, settling land disputes, brining change in cropping pattern etc. so that a sustainable source of livelihood may be ascertained.

After various rounds of discussion, it was concluded that Field Bunding, is perhaps, the only solution that can lead to holistic development of agriculture sector, capable of providing a permanent measure of earning livelihood over a period of time. A very ambitious target was set to cover cent-percent land holdings of the tribals for field bunding by the year ending 2011. For achieving this target awareness camps were organised at Gram Panchayat level and field bunding work was started from 11 June, 2009. Two hundred and eighty two employees were engaged in organising these camps and 117585 eligible farmers were identified. Technical and administrative sanctions were also obtained simultaneously. By 30th June, 2011 field bunding was done on 301215 acre of land belonging to 104573 households with financial implication of Rs.180.72 crores. It is expected that by the year end the field bunding work on the farms of 117585 households (52% of all rural households in the district) with an expenditure of Rs.205.77 crore will be completed.  

 The Agri Water solution (med bandhan) is implemented in 600 villages of 435 Panchayats of 9 development blocks of Mandla district of Madhya Pradesh state. The total tribal predominant rural population benefited is around five lakh (over 1 lack households) which includes schedule tribes, schedule castes, small & marginal farmers of Maikal Hill region in close proximity to the naxal infected Central India region.

 Mr KK Khare, the District collector geared up the DRDA machinery to work out a consolidated plan for linking Sustainable Livelihood with Food security and accordingly chalk out the plan for implementation covering maximum numbers of BPL families.

·         From 11-06-2009 the camps were organised at Gram Panchayat level for 32 days covering entire district to initiate the work of field bunding employing 282 employees every day,

·         In the district 117585 cultivator households were identified and technical and administrative sanctioned were obtained,

·         As on June 2011, 104573 households were benefited under the direct supervision of District Project Coordinator. The work executed through the district administration got the cooperation of Sarpanch/ PRIs and other grassroots level functionaries, 

·         The stakeholders included the officials of Panchayat and Rural Development Department, Rural Engineering and Water Resources Department, NGOs including CARD and ACT.

·         Presently CARD is helping in promoting the solution under AWM solution project with the help of Collector Mandla.

The solution (field bunding) is a continuous activity having annual targets and budget

CARD is working for its systematic replication in other areas

 The impact of field bunding work which can be verified in field is as follows:

 ·         The private fallow land has come under cultivation,

·         The price of the land of the tribals has enhanced appreciably,

·         Multi cropping pattern has started emerging,

·         The cultivators have been encouraged to take up the work of water conservation.

·         The soil conservation has been done in most farm fields

·         The water to the extent of 301215 hectare meter is being accumulated every year

·         The general attitude of the cultivators has become more positive which is a good reflection of development efforts in Naxal affected areas

·         The agriculture production has increased without enhancing cost of cultivation

·         The small cultivators have also been benefited which is evident from the levels of sales of produce made by them in support price determined by the government.

·         After field bunding the purchase of paddy of support price increased four times. For wheat three times and arrival of paddy in Krishi Upaj Mandi increased by two times. Similarly area under gram, peas, lentil increased by two times and area sown over bunding regarding tuar crop increased by two times.

Purchase of Paddy at Support Price

Purchase of Wheat at Support Price

Arrival of Paddy in Mandi

The area sown under Rabi crop

 The District Project Coordinator ascertained the requirement of the area and initiated the work of field bunding at Gram Panchayat level by involving various stakeholders like land owners, representatives of Gram Panchayat, district and grassroots level official functionaries etc. Putting up a team of 282 supervisors for more than a month, without disturbing routine departmental work was not possible without the strong push and motivation of the District Collector. Since the work of field bunding is target oriented the possibility of the corruption is least.

District collector has conceptualized the whole set of activities and set a time frame for it. He made a convergence mechanism for all the concerning department Schemes like Agriculture /watershed /DRDA /Tribal development and created a pool of resources. For example a land which has been treated under MNREGA provides employment to the farm owner as well as other labourers residing in his village, adding to this a pump set can be provided by tribal department with the well from sub scheme of MNREGA. So the beneficiary can be benefited under convergence program from all different department schemes and can improve its standard of living. A team of officials under the leadership of the District collector is working meticulously by associating all the primary stakeholders. BPL Families and the families who have been benefited by the land title recently under Forest Rights Act were also benefited under this scheme. Necessary administrative orders and continuous monitoring for effective implementation of the scheme since its launch in Oct 2009 and weekly reviews of the progress ensure timely corrective measures and speedy redress of grievances.

 Orders have been flashed out timely and on top of that continuous monitoring is the tool for effective implementation. Weekly review of the progress of the initiative in comparison to the total Households have been taken.

 The easily available, financially affordable and technically simple solutions are generally difficult to be promoted. It does not sound romantic to just dig a trench in your farm which a farmer can himself do. We need to promote it, and support with some engineering inputs, mainly in construction of waste water weirs in each farm. Further construction alone is not enough; moisture retention has to be complimented by replacing the agriculture practices and seeds as well. There are certain positive aspects associated with this initiatives;

 ·        Transparency and stakeholder participation

All the Med-bandhan and farm-ponds works are carried out at the individual’s fields after obtaining his consent and with the approval of gram sabha, the beneficiary keeps an eye watch on his/her work, and also works hard to complete it early. All the field bunding works carried out in MNREGA scheme commence after the administrative approval given by the gram Sabha and panchayat institutions. Technical sanctions and guidance is given by the technical staff. Gram Sabha identifies the needy people in its meetings and recommends the works in their farms/Lands. Decision of gram Sabha is ratified by the members.

The whole process is governed by people’s participation and checked by different stakeholders at various levels.

 ·        Innovativeness of the initiative

This Initiative could be a best model for replication because of its simplicity and implementation through the panchayats. At present every district has an opportunity in MNREGA to create sustainable livelihood opportunities for the rural folk. Continuous monitoring and support to the Panchyati Raj Institutions ensure wide acceptability, participation and publicity among the rural folks.

Field bunding work has been identified as only alternative to provide sustainable source of livelihood. Its simplicity, adoptability and affordability make it special and innovative, and ensure replicability.

 ·       Sustainability of the initiative

Once field bunds are constructed the farmers have improved farms with clear boundary demarcation which in turn reduces conflict among them. With bunding in every field they can hold the run off rain water for their paddy crop. These are permanent structures. Minor maintenance work has to be done by the beneficiaries which is practically nothing when compared with the benefits derived from such structures. Since the work is done in individual farm it has also checks corrupt practices due to self monitoring by the beneficiaries.

 The overall activities are adding value to the agriculture activities.

 The District has further plans of constructing 5000 khet talabs and 5000 wells per year as per the demand and justification in the district, with a vision wherein each farmer can harvest all season water by constructing well/ pond in his own farm and use it through individual or group based micro lift irrigation schemes. This will ensure many more acres of land under irrigation, much more agriculture production, and many more happy and prosperous livelihoods. In his future plan 486 cooperative societies will be formed to facilitate the Medbandhan beneficiaries’ licence of seeds, fertilizers, pesticides and direct access to Mandi will be extended to them to empower and eradicate the practice of middleman agents. Change in cropping pattern would be next priority in which district team would convert the traditional way of cropping to Ropa and SRI system due to which the poor marginal farmers would get more benefit out of their crop. In adding to all this, farmers would be provided the electric motor for regular water supply in convergence with the of S.G.S.Y. and I.T.D.P. schemes.

Otherwise, the solution is being implemented in all the tribal districts; but its scale is small. CARD now under the AWM project is helping project its benefits to scale up the scheme.

 Key Contacts:

1.       CARD, Bhopal the organisation which has documented the success story,

2.       District Collector, Mandla- the visionary of the programme,

3.       CEO-ZP Additional District Program Coordinator, Mandla,

4.       District Program Officer –MGNREGA

5.       All the Block level staff and all govt and non government executers, Member of PRIs etc

Contact Address:

Dr Vivek Sharma, CF

CARD, H-2/195, Arvind Vihar,

Bagmugalia, Bhopal-462043

Email: card_vivek@yahoo.com

Mr KK Khare,

District Collector,

Collector’ House, District Mandla 481661

Phone: 07642-250600

E.Mail: dmmandla@mp.nic.in

Attachments include:

I)                                  The Centre for Advanced Research & Development, Bhopal carried out a study “Impact of Farm Bunding in Sustainable Livelihood of Tribes of Mandla District in the Naxal Dominated Backward Gondwana Region of MP” during 2011.

II)                  International Water Management Institute (IWMI) in collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), International Development Enterprises (IDE), the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI), CH2M HILL, and several national and regional partners is implementing a three year project on Agricultural Water Management Solutions (AWM Solutions). The project aims to unlock the potential of small-scale agriculture to reduce poverty and hunger by assessing the feasibility and potential impacts of smallholder agricultural water management interventions in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia and identify and promote promising investments in agricultural water management.

 III)                  In this context a series of studies were carried out in Madhya Pradesh with the support of Centre for Advanced Research and Development (CARD), Bhopal on scope and potential of AWM Solutions in Madhya Pradesh. “MGNREGA– Promising Solutions for Agricultural Water Management?- An Assessment based on a case study in Madhya Pradesh” was taken up during 2010 for detailed study in the districts of Mandla, Balaghat, Jhabua and Khandwa district.

IV)                     A presentation on Mandla NREGA case study