Securing the Future: Biodiversity And Sustainable Livelihoods

By

Green Foundation1

Introduction

The genesis of this work in conserving genetic resources in agriculture and understanding the complexities of poverty and malnutrition goes way back to the 1970's. It was the decade of green revolution and hopes and promises of a better tomorrow looming in the horizon. At the peak of the nation rejoicing green revolution, we had the occasion to treat malnourished infants who were the victims of growing inequality and poverty. Women walked into the hospital trekking a long distance to have their children treated for marasmus and kwashiorkor with medicines. What was supposed to be an impact of inadequate food and nutrition was interpreted as a disease. For me it was the beginning of a search to understand the nexus between growing food production and social inequalities. Obviously, the deep maladies inherent in food production in the social mileau of poverty had to be addressed.

Three decades have passed by and much water has flown under the bridge. India’s population has grown and with it, the levels of poverty, grades of malnutrition and hidden hunger.  As we step into the portals of the 21^st century, countries of the South carry a huge debt burden. Developing countries have passively participated in the process of development in the last three to four decades.  The development model is synonymous with the development trends set by the countries. Today, we are on the threshold of globalisation and liberalized trade governed by the World Trade Organisation. There is no denying that the impact and burden of liberalisation has taken a toll on the levels of poverty.

It is widely believed that economic underdevelopment and overpopulation cause poverty and that the problem can be solved through economic development and population control. There is a naïve belief that by merely increasing investments, creating jobs, raising incomes and improving the general standard of living, poverty can be eliminated. We have, in our search for the answer to the question “why poverty?”, have stumbled upon the understanding that poverty is not the result of lack of development, poor technology, or scarce resources, but a manifestation of the very process of economic development that is supposed to cure it.  It is not uncommon to narrate the argument for development induced scarcity by citing the case of green revolution and the miracle seed implicated in the social construction of scarcity.

Green revolution became more than a matter of increasing food production by changing the very concept of food, technology, ecology and culture. A serious spill off of the introduction of new seeds was the accelerated loss of genetic diversity (Mooney 1979). Uniformity in crop cultivation was accompanied by intensive use of chemicals, especially pesticides. Similarly, introduction of water intensive crops drained the ground water thus resulting in the scarcity of natural resources. The chain of events starting with the miracle seeds to the use of the high external inputs, to exploitation of valuable natural resources represent the destruction of the productive base of subsistence.

Following close on heel is globalisation that is taking over the local economy and undermining the productive base of rural economy. Trade liberalistion has set the pace for exacerbating problems for the poor in many countries. As the answer to our search unraveled itself, a proactive initiative in the form of a grass roots program of sustainable agriculture starting with on-farm conservation to participatory genetic enhancement to empower the small farmer emerged. This precisely has set the ground for working intensively with marginalised farmers in backward regions. 

As we look back on the ten years, we can with confidence say that our efforts were focused and successful in reviving the genetic resources so basic to the survival of small farms. In the process we have tried to bring the economic, ecological, cultural and gender aspects of conserving bio-diversity together, not without remembering the fast emerging global changes and their political implications.

Our team has gone through cycles of hope and despair, sharing the anxieties of thousands of farmers due to changing weather patterns and success and failure of crops. The end of a decade has given room to more challenges while we have with us a human chain of farmers who hold hands with us in this effort.  Together we pledge to take the movement forward and I cannot but forget to quote Robert Frost who said

“The woods are lovely dark and deep, but I have promises to keep and miles to go before I sleep and miles to go before I sleep”

FARMER’S ASPIRATIONS: THE BASIS FOR ON FARM CONSERVATION

“If winter comes can spring be far behind?” P.B.Shelly

Traditionally, farmers not only used a wide range of crop species in their complex agricultural systems of inter cropping and agroforestry, but also incorporated varieties of each crop in small cultivation plots. Farmers mixed several varieties of the same or different crops, ensuring security against climate variations, pests and other forms of stress. Intercrops also act as live mulches and increase the biomass produced on the field. The output is increased because late varieties spread out after the harvest of the main set of crops.

Farmers chose crop types or varieties depending on requirements for optimum growth. The crop combinations chosen were such that they suited varied agroclimatic conditions such as low rainfall and high temperatures coupled with varied soil conditions.

In summary, the following are the reasons for traditional multi-cropping

1.      Insurance against failure of one crop due to failure of monsoon rains or other stresses.

2.      Output increases because late varieties spread out after the harvest of one set of crops.

3.      Inter cropping creates live mulches and increases biomass produced on the field.

4.      Crops are chosen according to soil depth and structure, water holding capacity, slope and drainage.

5.      Crop combinations that are suited for varied agroclimatic conditions are chosen.

In today’s fast changing socio-political environment with a thrust towards a new economic order, talking about subsistence farming and conservation of indigenous varieties of crops may seem out of time. But the fact remains that for more than 70 % of the population subsistence is crucial. 

The post-independence food scenario in India merely triggered changes in technology, turning a socio-economic problem into a technological issue. The Green Revolution augmented food production, relieving the food shortage. However, the negative consequences of green revolution have been enormously deleterious. The major outcomes are inequitable distribution of the benefits whatever they may have been, and vast genetic erosion.

Communities all over the world have well-developed knowledge systems and ways to derive their livelihoods from the bounties of nature in wild and domesticated forms. Today, however, the diversity of ecosystems, life forms and ways of life of different communities are under the threat of extinction. The primary threats to diversity have come from attempts at modernisation, industrialization and mono-culturisation of agriculture, over use of chemicals and unchecked urbanization.

Bio-resources and agriculture are two inseparable issues since bio-resources form the backbone of agriculture and people’s food security. Following the developments on the issue of plant genetic resource conservation both at the national and international level. Green Foundation (GF), working in the dry land regions of southern India, took the initiative to involve farmers in the on-farm conservation of the subsistence crops of the area.

The focus on resource conservation was coupled with a genuine concern to protect the resource base of the poor. This became the basis of a twin objective of environmental conservation and enhancement of women’s livelihood.  The platform for building the various programs of GF was formed by the establishment of women’s groups or sanghams  in 40 villages. Currently GF works in approximately 100 villages of the remote districts of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.

Green Foundation has been careful to analyze the impact of the changing regional cropping patterns and the degradation of natural resources. Despite the fact that modernization of agriculture has penetrated into interior villages, there still exist villages with poor communication and undulated land, covered partially by dry, deciduous forests.

Vestiges of traditional systems of agriculture remain in these areas. Agriculture was given prime importance as observed in the ancient texts. Agricultural land was divided as gadde or wet land, karagadde or dry land. Scriptures speak of many varieties of rice which include gandha sali or perfumed rice, rakta sali or red rice and sookma sali or small rice. Similarly scholars who travelled in the state of Karnataka in 1880 speak of different varieties of paddy such as dodda batha, kembuthi, yelakki raja and so on.(5)

Traditional agriculture in India is one of the oldest and most advanced forms of food production. It has proved to be inherently sustainable over centuries and rates high in all aspects of total productivity, self-reliance, diversity and the depth of its indigenous knowledge.

Traditional practices did not simply exist as a result of some divine revelation. They were, on the contrary, the result of an understanding of the mechanisms of nature; a result of a science that was accessible to people on a day-to-day basis and not of one confined to a laboratory. This involvement of the practitioners themselves played an important role in making the system sustainable.

Local people cultivated for subsistence. A simple study of year round food availability revealed people’s dependence on sources other than their own land, such as forests, ponds and lakes for at least part of the year. Thus the conservation of common property resources and the biodiversity there in, played a major role ensuring food security. The last two decades have witnessed several changes in the lives of the farming community.

With the advent of the Green Revolution and modernization of agriculture, changes in agricultural practices and cropping patterns have, amongst other consequences, led to the erosion of genetic diversity. Staple food crops of the region like finger millet and paddy were largely from high yielding varieties. The high yielding varieties were bred to exploit the yield potential of the parent lines thus compromising on the other essential qualities.  In other words they were from a narrow genetic diversity. Therefore, the aim of Green Foundation was to increase diversity both in terms of species and varieties. In the course of the last decade several of the indigenous varieties have once again found their way into the farmer’s fields.

Issues around extinction of Biodiversity  1. Growing urbanization leading to the neglect of agriculture. 2. Increasing cash crops and land going under floriculture 3.  Shifting cultivation to so called high value crops 4.  Difficulties in the processing of millets 5. Spreading of hybrids extensively leading to the erosion of biodiversity 6. Government policies undermining the underutilized crops.

                

Some of the highlights of Green Foundation’s work are:

1.      Along with the staple crops, several millets, pulses, oilseeds and vegetable seeds have been regenerated and distributed.

2.      The process involved in the on-farm conservation includes interaction with individual farmers, community farms, community seed supply, training of farmers as key seed keepers and forming an association of farmers to take the movement forward. Sustainable agricultural practices form a major component of the training.

3.      The high point of the annual event is the seed mela that is held in different locations where people gather to celebrate their culture and agriculture.

4.      As participatory research, farmers have been identified to participate in plant breeding through varietal selection.

5.      Finally, documentation of indigenous knowledge and cultural practices on biodiversity and its use, which paves the way for the revival and sustenance of the resource base of people.

THE LOCATION AND ITS PEOPLE

South of Bangalore in India, and close to this electronic and Computer City, a cluster of village’s nestles between the hillocks culminating in the mudumalai range of the Western Ghats. They are well shielded from the urban population and technological developments of the city and are populated mainly by farming communities and tribes. The traditional practices and perceptions of these rural people and the main stay of their daily life are outside the domain and interpretation of modern science. Life for the people in the rural area revolves around the natural resources and an important and integral component of natural resources are the biodiversity of all forms of life from the tiniest organism to the wide variety of flora and fauna. With increasing urbanization and automation of life, the burden placed on life support systems such as air, water, plant and animal life keeps increasing. The pressure on shrinking resources has brought many life forms to the brink of extinction.   

Conservation of plant genetic resources and biodiversity has been recognized as the most fundamental issue to sustainable farming and lasting food security (Altieri et al)(6). It is evident in the context of India where the last few decades of intensive modernisation of agriculture has narrowed the genetic base of cultivated crops.

Intensive agriculture has also contributed to the irrational use of natural resources resulting in extreme pressures on the resource-poor, small farmers, forcing them to compromise or abandon their sustainable farming systems.

It is in this context that Green Foundation has initiated a people’s movement for in situ conservation beyond the limited scope of gene banks. Building farmer-based community seed supply systems campaigning for farmer’s rights to biodiversity have been the main focus. It was conceived that on-farm conservation and sustainable agriculture could converge with partnerships between farmers, scientists and consumers, thereby making biodiversity conservation the basis of sustainable agricultural practice and sustainable consumption patterns.

In the deccan region the minor millets play an especially important role in the daily diets of people. These include finger millet, kodo millet, foxtail millet, little millet, proso millet and barnyard millet. These millets are rich in minerals like iron and calcium. The straw from these millets is particularly highly valued as cattle feed and the return from the straw alone compensates the expenses of cultivation.

Farming for better nutrition

Mixed cropping is an example of insurance against failure of crop being offset by the harvesting of other crops in subsistence agriculture. With the advent of dodda asalai Male (the big rain) in the month of July ragi is sown by scattering seeds in an arc using one’s hands. Mustard is mixed with   ragi  and this forms the basic fabric of the field. Jowar (Sorghum bicolor) and other small millets, plus avare (field bean) alsande (cow pea) and castor are mixed together in different proportions and sown in rows using a saddike, a hollow cut bamboo pipe 4 cm in diameter with a wooden cone on top. This is referred to as the aluve and the sowing starts after a pooja (celebration and offerings given to nature) is performed in the field.

Cattle draw the pipe in a straight line with the pipe either touching the ground at an angle or in an upright position. Tuvar (pigeon pea) and jola (sorghum), avare with foxtail millet and prosomillet and castor are mixed in small quantities, usually forming alternate rows in the ragi field. One row of ‘huchellu’  (niger) and ‘sanna alsande ‘ (cow pea) in the borders enables easier harvesting of ragi. Niger planted around the field acts as a pest repellant.

Like in any other place, the people here are also dependent on forests to meet a variety of their food needs. The forests have a variety of trees like neem (Azadrichta indica), hunise (Tamarindus indica) gandha (Santalum album) honge (Pongamia glabra), kari jali (Acacia arabica) Kaggali (Acacia cateebu) banni (Acacia ferruginea) to name a few. The flora include a variety of tubers among which the large “kadugenasu” (tuber found in the forest) is remarkable. The people have access to minor forest produce that is an additional source of income.

Agricultural Calendar

An agricultural calendar for farmers follows the movement of stars, and 27 such stars are identified by different names. According to the agricultural calendar constructed with the help of women farmers, the season starts with the ashwini (star) rains in the month of  May, when farmers begin preparing the land. 

With the krithika and rohini rains sowing of different crops begins. It is during this time that the reserve of food is at its lowest for the households as well as for the cattle. This period coincides with the magge male or the ‘big rain’ followed by the ubbe and uthrai male when the fields and neighbouring forests are full with diverse edible greens and other useful plants often termed as weeds in the conventional sense. This is a time of low employment and receding stocks of food. Women, children and men continue to get their food from other sources of existing biodiversity. This is a classic example of food not only cultivated grains but also a diversity of uncultivated vegetation that is widely available. 

In the ragi growing areas of southern India the first flower to bloom is mustard. Coinciding with the appearance of the flower a festival called Gowri pooja is celebrated which maintains the relationships of the plant with the water, soil and other crops. The Goddess Gowri is identified as the goddess of water, being essential for the growth of the crop, and with the fertility of the flower so that a good grain is formed. As part of the ritual the flowers are brought home and worshipped. In parts of the sorghum growing regions of Karnataka young unmarried girls collect contributions from the public by singing songs praising the power of Goddess Gowri. The girls bring fresh soil from the village pond to symbolise fertility and make an idol out of it. After the ceremony the idol is immersed in water. The ceremony thus rejuvenates the connections between soil, water and biodiversity.

Women – The seed keepers

Women play a major role in conserving the diversity at the farm level. It is the women who decide on the amount of seed that have to be stored, the variety and the different ways of storing them. The role of women in the selection of seeds begins when the crops come into flower because women are involved in weeding, harvesting crops and collecting grains, they watch plants grow through their whole life cycle and select the seeds.

Puteeramma is a farmer, mother, grandmother and seed conserver and organic cultivator all rolled into one. She lives in a small village hidden in the valley between the hilly slopes bordering Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. Frail in body but strong in her convictions about her heritage and traditions, she holds on to her five acres of totally rainfed land. She wakes up to the sound of birds on her land of finger millet, dry land paddy, lentils, redgram, field beans, cowpea and sorghum.

Puteeramma is not an isolated example of a woman who has internalised the need for conserving biodiversity in food crops. Women in rural communities' worldwide contribute to sustainability in food production. While the diverse tasks of women are extremely difficult to quantify there is no dispute about the role of women in securing food for the household. The role of women in subsistence agriculture is based on the multiple use of biomass for fodder, fertilizers, food and fuel. In addition to their responsibilities for the farm and the household women are custodians of the food basket of the family.

Putteeramma  believes  in returning to nature what she takes from it. Besides the diverse species of crops and animals that she conserved, Puteeramma also specialises in growing exclusive varieties of paddy and finger millet.

There are other features of self-sufficiency as in food and storage systems that need a special mention. Studies have indicated that women in India are major food producers in terms of value, volume and quality. An interesting study of gender division of labour has shown that women do 37% of sowing, 59% of interculturing, 60% of harvesting of crops, 59% of threshing and 69% of the work related to the tending of animals. Men and women work together in a complementary way. The difficulty arises when decisions have to be taken whether to grow for the market or for home consumption.  The key role of rural women as food producers and providers is directly related to the diversity of local food crops and the surrounding available bio diversity. The local market has only cereals and pulses to offer during the months after the harvest. Subsistence farmers therefore depend upon the planting material saved by women from their previous harvests. Women’s specialised knowledge of the use of domesticated crops extends to wild plants, including leaves, fruits, berries, nuts, seeds, edible roots and pulses.

For farmers like Puteeramma, biodiversity manifests in cultivated food as well as wild plants. This is however threatened by modern agriculture, which is fast replacing local genetic material. Common property resources that are the reservoirs of biodiversity are uncared for or exploited. These threats especially affect the people that rely their survival.

The traditional Indian system of people’s rule through panchayats or local self-governance was dismantled during the British Colonial rule. Panchayats were responsible for the care and maintenance of all common property resources.   After independence, the panchayats were restored but only for administrative purposes, while the responsibility to care for the common property resources continue to be vested with the governments. Local knowledge, skills and social and cultural diversity in the use of natural resources are not acknowledged in the panchayati institutions. Women like Puteeramma are struggling to maintain their identity, culture, biodiversity, under such a changed regime of governance.

ON FARM CONSERVATION: BREAKING NEW GROUND 

The last three decades of development in India based on the Nehruvian model (with importance given to industrialization) witnessed, amongst many other things, the disappearance of social institutions and the culture of rural people. As a result, agriculture, the main stay of the people was transformed from a predominantly peasant based livelihood into a subsidiary activity.  Agriculture is now mainly dependent on loans and credits and is being highly influenced by the agriculture extension departments to move towards dependency on the market forces for all   inputs, starting with the seed.

It is in this backdrop that a plant genetic resource conservation program ensuing in village-based community seed banks was conceived. Over the years the program has grown through stages of collection, multiplication, monitoring, evaluation and farmer participation in selection, rating and distribution. The challenge was in integrating the seed conservation efforts with the remnants of indigenous practices by reinvesting people’s faith in their own systems.

The people here call agriculture aaramba literally meaning ‘the beginning’. The first ploughing starts in early April followed by a series of activities, the last of which is threshing and transporting the grain to their homes. During February and March, when the direction of the winds is favourable winnowing is performed. This is marked by the arrival of the New Year celebrated with joy and gaiety. After a pause starts the summer shower and aaramba.

Indigenous practices of agriculture depended largely upon good rainfall and ample organic manure. This facilitated good harvest of grains. The mixed cropping favoured cultivation of diversity that enhanced the ecological and economic conditions.

SEED COLLECTION AND MULTIPLICATION

Minor millets include finger millets, kodo millets, foxtail millet and barnyard millet are grown over 7 million hectares in India producing 5 million tones of grain. The crops are very similar to the millets grown in the Sub-Saharan Africa. According to a recent report by the National Research Council in the first of a planned series of reports titled “Lost crops of Africa”(7), an expert panel examining the grains said that Africa has more indigenous varieties of cereal than any other continent, including its own species of rice, millet, sorghum and a dozen other crops.

The richness of the varieties of millets in the dry lands of southern India are similar. The minor millets as they are called include finger millet, pearl millet, kodo millet, foxtail millet, little millet, proso millet and barnyard millet. Finger millet alone accounts for 2.6 million hectare with a production of 3 million tonnes and is the staple food for millions of people in Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, Maharastra and Bihar.

The different millet varieties were collected from similar ecosystems (map) and identified by the distinctive names given by farmers. Finger millet varieties are known in the vernacular as Jenugoodu Karikaddi, Majjige, Sannakaddi. Small quantities of seeds were multiplied to be later distributed to the farmers.  Rainfed and wetland varieties of paddy are also a major component of the collections.

It was very obvious from a participatory rural analysis that the diversity in the area was richer three decades ago than what it is now. Farmers were able to correlate the arrival of high yielding varieties and decrease in the intra species diversity of crops that were grown as intercrops. This area proved to be a good case for rehabilitation of the lost diversity.  

The seed conservation program was aimed at capacity building at the grassroot level, enabling the local communities to focus on low external input cultivation systems. From the very beginning it was recognised that ‘on-farm conservation’ cannot be sustained through external subsidies, and that the seed production is based on organic cultivation.

The concept of a movement around seed conservation was not familiar to the people though many of the older generation eagerly welcomed the idea since knowledge of the indigenous cultivars did exist amongst them.

In selecting a site for on-farm conservation, different criteria were considered.

They are:

1.      An area where dry land subsistence farming was practiced

2.      The context of socio-economic and cultural diversity was relevant

3.      Land races were under the threat of genetic erosion

4.      Rich in farmers’ knowledge and skills in seed selection and conservation

5.      Accessibility of the area

6.      Access to a market

7.      Where intra species diversity still exists

On-farm conservation sharply focused on:

1.      Widening the status of bio-diversity

2.      Conserving land races by value addition to local crop diversity

3.      Strengthening the process of on-farm conservation through participation

4.      Enhancing the value of bio-diversity and increasing productivity

Value-addition has been brought about in two ways. The first involved improving the quality, disease resistance, yield, taste and other preferred traits through seed treatment for improved germination. And by building resistance against seed borne diseases and yield. The other involved adding value to increase the demand for the material or improve the derived product.

Seed melas are the high point of the year-long activities that follow the agricultural seasons. The occasion provides an opportunity for farmers to select the varieties and interact with other farmers with similar interests. Thus every year the number of farmers who conserve the varieties of millet, upland rice and low land rice increases. The seeds are also exchanged from farmer to farmer. Between the year 1994 and 2001, the increase in number of farmers who participated in the seed conservation and the villages to which the concept spread are indicated in Figures 1 and 2.

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Community farming with women

Women who had land but could not cultivate it due to extreme conditions of poverty were involved in community farming with inputs to facilitate the seed bulking. The harvest of the multiplied grains is shared amongst the women who participated in the community farming with a share given to the foundation for further distribution.

The focus of organising the farmers around the issue of seeds is on improving the seed supply system and on strengthening the farmers' role

as conservers and producers.

Crop improvement trough participatory varietal selection

Farmers have been involved in breeding of crops ever since agriculture began. The intervention of “experts” is only a recent trend. In the past, farmers played the role of plant breeder, by domesticating wild species, transporting seeds to new areas, adapting varieties to new ecological niches and selecting plants that had special value. In contrast to this, the modern approach to plant breeding has become centralized with a rapid increase in land under modern varieties, thus eliminating the farmer’s varieties. As a result now it is a universal phenomenon to see monocultures of a few varieties being grown. As an important step towards seed conservation and creating a stable system of community seed supply, a participatory breeding program was initiated to involve farmers in the varietal selection process.

The approach to varietal selection involves four phases

1.      Identifying farmer’s needs in a variety

2.      Searching for suitable material for on-farm trials

3.      On-farm trials to test acceptability in farmers’ fields.

4.      Wider dissemination of farmer-preferred varieties.

A VILLAGE LEVEL PARTICPATORY RURAL APPRAISAL:

CRITERIA FOR CHOICE OF FINGER MILLET AND RICE CROPS

RAGI

RICE

There has been a consistent increase in the varieties that have been conserved by the farmers in the case of Ragi (Figure 3) and Rice, both wetland (Figure 4) and dry land (Figure 5).

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Managing The Spread Of Indigenous Cultivars

It is now recognised that farmers’ varieties are morphogenetically distinct populations of a crop, selected and maintained as populations rather than as specific pure-line cultivars. It is for this reason that the indigenous varieties exhibit great intra-specific diversity and in some cases, inter-specific diversity as well (Stapith et al)(8). The fact that land races contribute to stable food production and income especially in marginal environments where the impacts of modern varieties is limited or less effective has been well documented.

Jarvis et al (1998)(9) suggested that in in-situ conservation there was great potential to 1) conserve the process of local adaptation of crops to their environments. 2) conserve diversity at all levels, the ecosystem, the species  and the genetic diversity within species 3) improve the livelihood of farmers 4) maintain or increase control and access of farmers over their genetic resources 5) involve farmers directly in the value addition process and 6) integrate farmers into the national plant genetic resource system for conservation and 7) maintain evolutionary processes. 

Over the last few years, from 1994 to 2001, where the genetic diversity had narrowed to only two high yielding varieties of ragi farmers have broadened the genetic base by conserving 52 indigenous varieties. Thirty seven varieties of rainfed paddy and thirty two varieties of irrigated varieties have been added to the gene pool of the area. Highlights of the seed conservation include (other than individual farmers), community farming by women, community seed distribution, training of farmers as seed keepers and an association of farmers who will be important in taking the movement ahead.

The high point of the annual event is the seed ‘mela’, which is held in different locations where people gather to celebrate their culture. To sum it up, conservation of land races is not just an exotic exercise. The aim is to link it with indigenous knowledge systems and endow it with the power of modern science in order to ensure self-reliance and food security.

Some Results

In the year 1997, a handful of ‘Godavari’, a wetland paddy variety, was grown by one farmer in Yerandapanahalli. By the year 1999, 25 farmers from this and surrounding villages had begun to multiply seeds of this unique wetland paddy. Dry land paddy, ragi and millet varieties are also being revived. On-farm conservation of traditional crops, and marketing of the surplus seed varieties to fellow farmers has begun to re-establish itself in these villages. The objective of this conservation is in the qualitative improvement of crops sustainable livelihood systems.

A total of 607 farmers in 95 villages are participating in on-farm conservation activities, besides the many farmers who have informally acquired the seeds from the conservation center. The traditional crop varieties revived cover a range of food-crops, like finger millet, dry lad paddy, wet land paddy, pearl millet, sorghum, maize, little millet, foxtail millet, kodo millet and proso millet. Also traditional varieties of beans, peas, greens, brinjal, tomato, red gram, green gram, black gram, horse gram, chilli, gourds, oil seeds and other vegetables have been revived.

A new element of participatory plant breeding has been added. Farmers determine their selection criteria, such as high yield, medium-sized grains with good colour, resistance to pests and diseases, drought tolerance, sweet and starchy, non-lodging but good height, good straw yields, late maturity, and other plant characteristics, such as number of tillers, and length and width of leaves.

On the demo farm seed varieties from other eco-regions have been collected and experimented with, to determine their viability and acceptability in the farmer’s fields. Germination testing, close crop monitoring on the effect of drought, as well as pest and disease resistance, grain and fodder yield are determined. Presently the different varieties conserved in the seed bank are : 41 varieties of dry land paddy, 36 varieties of wetland paddy, 70 varieties of finger millet, 10 varieties of little millet, 6 varieties of sajje, 10 varieties of sorghum and 6 varieties of foxtail millet.

From Project to Movement

The external evaluation performed in April 2000 concluded that, due to the efforts of Green Foundation, an appreciable increase in seed diversity has been established in the project region. Maintaining the enthusiasm of the farmers to retain the good elements of traditional practices will also depend on the ability of the Green Foundation to facilitate a wider movement. This up-scaling needs to be done at several levels: at the village level, by strengthening the village level organizations, at the NGO level, by networking and experience sharing with other institutions, and at the general policy level.

The sanghas and the village-level seed management committees are a way of decentralizing and strengthening activities at the grassroots level, forming a ‘farmer seed conservation network’ is another. Green Foundation has also concentrated on networking with other NGOs and organisations, both in India and abroad. A strong farmer network and strategic alliances are needed to bring about changes in general policy. This will further stimulate farmers to secure their livelihoods by conserving the genetic diversity of their crops and of the natural environment that surrounds them.

The logical question that emerges at this point is how has Green Foundation conceptualised and fulfilled its objective to revive the cultural and bio-genetic diversity, both important aspects of endogenous development?

The different steps adopted were:

Creating awareness and fostering bonds at the grassroot level through ways of communication that are culturally acknowledged and understood combined with proactive involvement of the community in events such as the seed fairs.

Rural communication has been by and large, oral integrating various forms such as theatre, puppetry, ballads and folk dances. Green Foundation has used puppetry and street theatre to create awareness on the issue of globalisation and its impact on farmers.  Folk songs and dances that are being lost are revived during seed fairs, thus ensuring their continuation.. Women go from one village to another after the harvest telling stories of the flora and fauna. Green Foundation has taken the lead in honouring such people (during seed fairs), considered as the torchbearers of their own culture.         

Documentation of indigenous knowledge systems and culture centered on diversity, which has become an ongoing and integral component of the conservation programme.

It was found that indigenous knowledge represented successful ways in which people utilised the resources in their environment. In documenting indigenous practices a combination of methods were used including observations, participatory rural appraisals, guided field walks and obtaining reliable information from the elders in the villages. Often it was found that form, content, language, and a host of other factors are unavailable to the local communities since cultural values have been eroded. This is also due to the fact that indigenous knowledge has a strong practical base, but sometimes a weak theoretical foundation and unless a concerted effort to transfer the knowledge orally is made, the next generation may have little available in written form.

The approach taken by Green Foundation was to identify the most beneficial practices that are fast disappearing in a changing world, and revive it by involving different sections of the local population.

Using innovative methodologies like participatory rural appraisals (PRA) to record the oral culture.

It is rather difficult to acknowledge and comprehend the fact that people belonging to different cultures think and articulate differently. Moreover, it is difficult to comprehend rural perceptions of the world with an urban bias. Hence GF uses different methods to comprehend people’s expressions including participatory rural appraisals. Very simple tools are used to draw, illustrate and define expressions on the floor. For example farmers engage themselves in evaluating the different varieties giving them a rank according to various preferred criteria.

Experimentation with the different rituals, ethno-veterinary cures and biodynamic methods. To improve seed quality and soil fertility.

Green foundation’s approach to revitalising cultural practices starts with documentation but does not end there. If these practices are to be revived, it is necessary to experiment with these rituals, understand the subtle nuances and give them scientific validation.

For example, practices such as treating livestock through ethno veterinary practices are on the verge of extinction, as seen in the practice called ‘maddina madike” which means medicinal pot.

This practice has been successfully revived in many Villages by bringing the attention of the farmers to the Valuable medicinal plants (see box)

The leaves of the medicinal plants are soaked in water and left in a pot for several days after which the water is used for treating various ailments in livestock. Green Foundation, drawing attention to this practice, has also helped in reviving the institution of indigenous healers in the local area.
 

Similarly, seed treatment practices for withstanding stress and ensuring early germination were documented after experimentation. A successful method of treating seeds to improve the germination rate is the salt-water treatment. The density of salt water was standardized using an egg, which is allowed to float. In this salt water, paddy seeds are soaked for 30 minutes before sowing. This method was found effective not only in improving seed germination but also in controlling blast disease.  Green Foundation has initiated the recovery of such practices wherever they have been eroded. These have been the practical approaches to strengthening the efforts towards endogenous development.

It is not only in reviving and strengthening the lost practices that GREEN FOUNDATION has intervened but also in adding value to people’s eroding knowledge. Appropriate knowledge including biodynamic farming has been added to the farming practices in the cultivation of rice. The genesis of biodynamic farming goes back to the early part of the last century when Rudolf Steiner explained the relationship of the earth and soil with the formative forces of nature. Steiner emphasised that the health of the soil, plants and animals depended upon interconnecting nature with the cosmic creative forces, which is very similar to the vedic and folk knowledge that existed in the Indian subcontinent.

Finally strengthening endogenous development initiatives by creating institutional structures and human resources at the grassroots level.

Creating institutional structures

Strengthening village level organisations is another central element of Green Foundation’s methodology. Distribution of indigenous seed varieties was first conducted from the Green Foundation’s biodiversity conservation center in Thali. Later on, the aim became to strengthen and promote decentralized systems of seed distribution. The villagers opted for reviving or starting farmers sanghas, an old type of village level organisation. The general membership of these groups is between 15 and 25. Very often there were women only groups. Members of the sanghas are represented in the village seed committees.

The village level organisations develop their own initiatives and act accordingly.  They identify seed requirements for the following year and select and purchase their stock from the savings of sangha members. In each of the sanghas, a central storage room has been identified, and resorting to traditional methods is conserving seeds. Room space for seed storage and purchase of storage devices are contributions from sangha members.

It is important to include women in these village level organisations since women play a very crucial role in agriculture as well as in all walks of life. When it comes to decision-making and social positioning, however, they are often marginalized. In the power relationship between men and women, they are on the receiving end. We have observed an increasing awareness among them.

Constraints:  

There have been many constraints in implementing the programme on conservation.

They could be grouped as natural phenomena manifest as failure of rains and drought, economic pressures such as the elusive logic of the market, political environment causing vulnerability of the poor, eroding natural resource base, insensitive government policies to follow the argument of  modernising agriculture based on unsound technologies. It took more than three decades to introduce the green revolution technologies that caused the genetic erosion of diversity and by the same argument it will require considerable time to revive the lost genetic resources. From our experience it was obvious that persistant efforts are needed to keep the momentum.

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Follow up

The ten years of field work on conservation of land races has laid a firm foundation to the cause. It was not only the diversity that was on the threat of extinction but also the centuries of accumulated experience and skills of peasants that was threatened. The value of the programme of On Farm Conservation lies in the utility of the conserved landraces not only as breeding material but also as a source of food security. It was also learnt that the improvement of the potential of the land races, development of market for farmer’s produce, establishment of community based seed networking and integration of conservation strategies at all levels are the priority areas considered necessary to sustain a system. Creating networks such as community based seed production, marketing and distribution system were the best way to address the needs of small farmers.

This approach has enabled farmers to control the choice of crop types adapted to local conditions. Building the confidence of farmers by critically evaluating the relative merits of a wide range of cultivars enables self-sustenance of farmers as against dependency on the market.

The community seed banks are low cost, low technology system, owned and managed by the local communities. The concept of Community Seed Bank comprises of two major components: a seed store and germplasm repository for local crop improvement, complementary to the field gene bank. The seed store represents a seed reserve consisting of landrace material locally grown. The store becomes a backup to the local market networks where farmers normally exchange seeds and information. The seed reserve that the Community Seed Banks maintain becomes crucial to ensuring a sustained supply of adapted seeds, channeled through the informal market system. Thereby averting the potential loss of genetic diversity.

The seed storage units are the traditionally used systems like clay pots, underground pits, and seeds bundled into straw baskets. There is scope to improve the structures depending upon local skills.

In the chain of events that constitute a successful On Farm Conservation network, Community Seed Banks occupy an important place. Green Foundation’s next phase of work is aimed at spreading Community Seed Banks across the state of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.

1 c/o Dr. Vanaja Ramprasad, Post Box No. 7561, Bilekahalli Bannerghatta Road, Bangalore, India 560076

Tel. No. [080] 6783858, Fax No. [080] 6591729, email: van@vsnl.com, www.greenconserve.com