Update of Agricultural Rehab - towards Success

Since our eighth visit, there had been no update, except a small note from Angshuman. You must be wondering that if we stopped our Help Sunderban Intiative in the five villages of Chargheri area (Chargheri, Parasmani, Lahiripur, parasmani and Bishan Colony) . The answer is NO – we are there – works were in progress but we were just waiting for some results before we inform you about the success of our initiative.

Last time we informed about our visit to Chargher on 10^th October for distribution of seed. Yes, we distribute seeds of vegetables (Begun, Lanka, lalshak, Palongshak, mulo. Gajor, beet, olkapi, uchhe,borboti, vebdi, lau, kumro) to 265 families. Next day the seeds were distributed to 150 families through our agricultural trainers. The remaining seeds were brought back by us and later again transported to Chargheri and distributed to a 145 families in the presence of our Agricultural trainers. This carrying back and forth was troublesome, but was necessary to prevent any misuse of seeds and to ensure proper preservation.

Last Saturday our Agricultural trainers were in Chargheri area for follow up training and reported that the results are encouraging. Begun and Lal shak is not so successful, some failures are also noted for barbate and seam but the overall results are encouraging They are expecting a good harvest. In all the situation is upbeat.

Another good thing is that following our suggestions and advise, the villagers have formed a cooperative (unregisted) with representatives form all five villages. They are supposed to communicate with the trainers about problems encountered during the post training farming and any related issues. We had regular contact over phone with some of these cooperative members and they seem to work well in coordination.

We suumarise our agricultural rehabilitation program:

• We arranged the agricultural trainings by the trainer from an organization SWANIRVAR,who has successfully carried out similar trainings in Aila affected areas of Hingalgunge. .
• Mr Naran Chandra Bachar and Mrs Anjana Mandal have imparted training for 14 days spread over their 5 trips to Chargheri. After distribution of seeds, another two days follow up review and problem solving session was held last weekend.
• Direct training was provided to around 260 villagers the five villages, trainings were arranged in different places of these five villages to facilitate uniform opportunity for participation.
• We encouraged the villagers to spread the training through “each one teach one” process and another 340 people get “indirect” trained by directly trained trainees. We allowed villagers who are not PAKT card holder (introduced during relief) to take part in the training program. Only requirement was the trainee should have his own land.
• The training not only taught techniques of vegetable faming in this type of saline water affected land but also generated asset maps of the villages, crop calendar etx. Trainees were enlightened on general cropping practices, problems of natural disasters and rising of sea water level.
• We only provided seed to the villagers who completed training. Around 600 villagers were eligible on this ground.
• We procured seeds from SWANIRVAR by paying them the necessary amount. Each set of seed packet (comprising seeds of 14 different vegetables) cost us 55 Rs (including packing). We asked the villagers to give 20 Rs for each set of seed packet. This was basically to get their commitment for pursuing the agriculture and to manage the three fold increase in the number than our initial estimate. It is worthy to mention that during distribution the villagers themselves admitted it would have cost them around 80 Rs, to get this quality and quantity of seeds from market. In total 550 seed packets were distributed.
• The training program so far cost us around 18,000 Rs. and the seeds around Rs. 34,000.