Rural India is home of the original gig-economy worker. Enterprising villagers hop from tilling fields to tending shops, to door-to-door selling each day. Read the latest trends in micro-enterprises, rural start-ups and the shifting livelihoods of India’s villagers.
Livelihoods
Damage to Kashmiri handicrafts is affecting livelihoods
Sales of handmade Kashmiri carpets and shawls, which are the most profitable proportion of the valley’s once-thriving handicrafts industry, have declined drastically as machine-made products flood the market
Impure honey eats into small producers’ margins
Independent and small beekeepers are uniting against adulterated and diluted honey sold in the domestic market by companies fighting a price war
India should gear up for a blue revolution
The productivity of inland fisheries can be boosted massively if governments get out of the way of operations and let fish enterprises grow across India
Communities in Andhra Pradesh find success in inland fisheries
Minimal interventions in Andhra Pradesh districts such as Visakhapatnam, Vizianagaram, and Anantapur show that it is possible to boost the productivity of inland fisheries without too much effort
Drummer girls of Bengal step up with a new beat
Despite long neglect, the dhak might be getting a new lease of life as women have stormed a male bastion and have taken up playing Bengal’s traditional big drum
It’s much better to dig than to build for water
Learning from some exemplary instances in drought-prone Marathwada, it makes sense for government programs to dig tanks and deepen streams for water sufficiency instead of building expensive structures
Kerala fights drought with recharged wells
For a region that does not want for water, Kerala is extending a rainwater harvesting programme in the central district of Thrissur to all parts of the state following the recent droughts
Palghar’s tribal farmers sow and sell as a collective to reap benefits
Collective farming is not only helping farmers sell their produce far and wide but has also arrested migration and increased the well-being of farmer families
Banni pastoralists see success in battle for survival
The Maldharis of the vast Banni grasslands in Gujarat show how people cope with enforced change caused either by natural forces or human intervention and how vulnerability can be turned into opportunity