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
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
Convenience drives farm practices more than sustainability
For all talk of sustainable farming practices than often entail increased drudgery, there is a clear trend that farmers are swayed by convenience and ease of use more than anything else
Faulty farm ponds pockmark tribal villages in Palghar
Constructed under the Maharashtra government’s Jalyukt Shivar scheme to end water scarcity in the state, these structures hold no water. Some were washed away in the first rains, making a mockery of the implementation
Integrated organic farming revives Nemmeli’s fields
A holistic method of organic farming has reversed the harm reached to Nemmeli village due to high-intensity, high-inputs agriculture. It has also helped in pushing back soil salinity
Small vegetable and poultry farmers severely affected by demonetization drive
Three weeks into the surprise announcement by the government to withdraw high denomination currency notes from circulation, it is now clear that producers of perishable commodities such as vegetable and poultry have been seriously impacted