Towards Green Trades

Skills in Organic Farming

An attempt is made through this book to recognize the skills of traditional farming that is being practiced by farmers, especially in Rajasthan. The book is to create widespread knowledge on simple skills that can be acquired by farmers for better management of their crops. In-fact so far these skills were limited to various agricultural produces, but never thought of converting these knowledge and skills as revenue models. The skills and knowledge that is already available could be consolidated and further converted for better livelihood. Therefore, key purpose of this book is to provide recognition to the skills and knowledge acquired by the farmers of Rajasthan and create a platform for sustainable livelihood through training and practices.

This book takes you through realizing several skills and knowledge whichispart of farming among the farmers were, especially in rural sector. In addition, it covers small tips to increase the efficiency while preparing organic manure and pesticides. It's true, the information’s are known to the farmers and it was in use for generations. We feel that these information’s are very relevant for the farmers who are forced to do chemical farming due to various reasons.

Topics covered include better crop production techniques, pest management and other aspects in organic farming in a cost-effective manner. We also believe that the small farmers and landless farmers can make revenue through products of organic manure and pesticides by making use of the skills. There are also few new knowledge and skills like bio-gas plant which is technically proven as a simplest form of technique for the multipurpose use. Therefore, we believe that this book will in turn help the farmers for creating new avenue for livelihood. The Hindi version of the book is also available which will be very useful for the farmers as grassroot level. Overall, we believe that the content is very useful as the book is mostly focused on skill development in organic farming sector for livelihood enhancement.

In order to bring out this book a team of partners along with FVTRS team had a series of planning meetings where we could arrive at on the matters that to be published in the book. All the Partner organizations of Rajasthan contributed in preparing the content of the book and it was documented by Mr.Ajay Pandey and Mr. Deepak Sharma with the support of Mr. Bhanwarlal. The final Hindi version of the book was translated to English with the help of Mr. Prem Shankar and the Hindi version was reviewed by Mr.Rajaram. Mr. Naresh Madawat has written the introduction of the book. We have tried our level best to use simple language in articulating methods, usages and benefits of various practice. Thus, it can be understood by the farmers.

In India, the school dropout rate has been quite high, the percentage of skilled population has been very low and the migration rate has been ever on the increase. Poverty remains a chronic condition for almost 30 per cent of India’s rural population especially members of scheduled castes, tribes and other excluded communities in the country's rural areas. The unskilled nature of the human resources available in the cities, the increasing demand for skilled labour and the high living standards in the urban areas have made the lives of the migrated poor and the marginalised groups more vulnerable.

Almost 400 million people - more than 85 per cent of the working population in India - work in the unorganised sector. Of these, at least 120 million are women. There has been no systematic and concerted attempts made to skill them better, update and diversify their skills. All formal vocational and technical training institutes demand for the minimum qualification the lowest being 10th passed. Even the CSR initiatives in skill training is also demanding minimum 10th pass. Most of the jobs in industry requires minimum 10th passed certificate. On the other hand those who are not able to reach even 10th standards are from the most marginalized communities and there are no institutes or organisations focusing on their wellbeing.

EXTERNAL EVALUATION OF FVTRS SKILL TRAINING PROGRAMME

JULY 2015 TO NOVEMBER 2015

In India the demand for skilled workforce has risen to support the growing economy, the youth of the country, particularly from marginalized communities, is not yet gainfully employed due to, inter alia, lack of skills and capital. This only increases the extent of distress migration and the young persons landing up in various unskilled jobs. The situation of the young women is worse, with limited safe mobility options and discrimination at home.

Functional Vocational Training and Research Society (FVTRS) is trying to address this issue with a mission to make the target community from socially marginalized sections – school dropout and illiterate youth – employable by building their skills to earn quality living through a job of their choice, or preferably as entrepreneurs to generate more employment for others. FVTRS has adopted a partnership model and currently implements projects through more than 80 partners in different States of India.

In order to assess the strengths and weaknesses of the FVTRS program in terms of relevance, effectiveness, efficiency and sustainability, an evaluation was conducted by an external team comprising of Mr. Khilesh Chaturvedi, Ms. Rosy Choudhury and Mr. Munish Kaushik. The evaluation was conducted from July to November 2015 using a participatory methodology. Besides consultations with FVTRS team, 15 partners from 10 states from all the zones (North, East, North East, West, Central and South) were visited,including meeting the youth who have completed or undergoing the training.

The specific objectives of the evaluation were

• To assess FVTRS’ sprogramme with the criteria “relevance”, “effectiveness”, “efficiency”, and “sustainability” and identify the strengths, good practices and weaknesses.
• To recommend options, approaches and strategies for enhancing the strengths and reducing the weaknesses and making the programme sustainable

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National Skill Conference of FVTTRS is an important event held annually in Bengaluru aims to bring together key government representatives, Skill providing organizations, Industry leaders, CSR for mutual collaboration and knowledge sharing. The conference will deliberate and disseminate on relevant to the sector, and understand new perspectives and actions with innovations, as well as the challenges being faced by service providers. It is also an occasion to share best practices and scale up by introducing new modules and modifying approaches, incorporating all that is relevant in today's context.

Goal of the Conference

A good skill fraternity is a nation having a discussion with itself to help underprivileged youth make informed choices in the process of introducing them to the world of work. The National Skill Conference is a platform where a wide spectrum of stakeholders converges to discuss, deliberate and disseminate on relevant options for the sector, and understand new perspectives and actions with innovations, as well as the challenges being faced by service providers. It is also an occasion to share best practices and scale up by introducing new modules and modifying approaches, incorporating all that is relevant in today's context.