Chandigarh March 24, 2022

Products made by participants sell like hot cakes

Panjab University’s workshop based on the research project “Transforming India’s Green Revolution by Research and Empowerment for Sustainable Food Supplies (TIGR2ESS)” ended here today. More than 20 Indian and UK institutions have been involved in the project. Many faculty members from several teaching departments of PU are members of this project under the overall leadership of Prof Ramanjit Johal of the Public Administration department.

As part of the program today, an exhibition was held by the trainees from these villages at the Student Centre displaying the items made by them under this project which sold like hot cakes. In addition, a policy dissemination workshop was held at the Golden Jubilee Hall. The first session chaired by ex-IAS Suresh Kumar was on sustainable farming wherein Prof Suveera Gill assessed sustainable farming practices in Punjab.

Prof Suveera Gill started the first technical session by informing about her work on sustainable farming. She enlightened the audience about various facets on farming in Punjab with various comparisons from 1966-67 to 2019-20. These include the area under each crop, the MSP, and terrestrial water and how they’ve changed over time. Data was collected from 71 villages across 6 districts in Punjab via field visits, interviews and the use of secondary data as well. The session included a presentation on malnutrition in villages and how it can be tackled.

Discussion on problems related to farming in Punjab

Ex IAS Suresh Kumar, who was a panelist in the first technical session stressed that there has to be a policy to shift farmers from paddy. He added that Punjab’s groundwater is rapidly decreasing and without an intervention in near future, it will be a major issue. For example, Punjab can increase its maize production by incentivising the same which is not being done by the policymakers. Mr Kumar said, “5000 years ago, Punjab had 38 crops, today we have just 4 left.” He also said that policy needs to be changes as per needs on the ground. Farmers in the audience questioned why policymakers were not doing enough to mitigate the side-effects of the green revolution. Some wanted to know why MSP was not being introduced for more crops along with market incentives. To this, Mr Kumar said, “Farmers are willing to and waiting for change but system needs to facilitate it”.

For nutrition and well being, the session was chaired by Dr R Padmaja & Prof Shumone Ray. The presenters in the session included Dr Amanjot Kaur, Chef Jaswinder Singh, Ms Bharati Goel and Dr Bharati Garg. The next session on Skill and Entrepreneurship was chaired by Prof K Narayanan & Prof Srijit Mishra. Prof Monika Aggarwal analysed the skill gap in Fatehgarh Sahib and Amritsar and also informed of the entrepreneurial intervention in two villages. The presentation on soft skills training that was imparted to the youth was presented by Dr Bhawana Gupta.

Finally, Prof Shailaja Fennel from University of Cambridge joined the discussion virtually and  spoke about the way forward in adopting a systems approach towards sustainability. Closing remarks were presented by Prof Shumone Ray and Prof Ramanjit K Johal.

A brief description of the various activities and studies undertaken for this project are as under:

• To study sustainable farming, a qualitative analysis of 125 farmers was carried out and gave insight into their experiences and challenges as well as their suggestions on factors aiding the scaling up of sustainable agricultural practices. The viability of farmer producer companies and the costing of nutritionally balanced north-Indian thali was worked out to capture the institutional and dietary facets of farming and food.
• An action-oriented study was conducted in village Pandwala, Mohali and Bagh Sikander, Fatehgarh Sahib with an intention to impart sewing training to rural women, to foster entrepreneurship among select rural women and to establish microenterprises. With sustained efforts and interventions, a significant change in mindset was noticed in terms of becoming more creative, self-sufficient and taking up entrepreneurship as source of sustainable living. Finally, two SHGs were created and became operational.
• An online 6-week Soft Skill Development Workshop notably improved tangible and technical skills such as resume-writing, official documentation and communication, use of ICT and social media, video-making, personal grooming and interview skills at the end of the programme. A total of 34 participants (volunteers, employees and students from the international NGO- Youth Football Club, Rurka Kalan, rural Jalandhar) attended the programme. The objective was enhancing the ‘employability’ of rural and peri-urban youth, with special focus on women, by improving their skill levels.
• Under the Nutrition intervention, nutrition curriculum was developed for rural women and in partnership with MBCT, Bassi Pathana, and PSDM, Ludhiana Centre three were held. In both male and female trainees, consciousness of being healthy eaters and enhanced knowledge about basic nutrition food groups, the food platter etc. was noted. Notable changes in their daily eating habits – eating at the right time, appropriate water consumption, including different food sources in diet etc. were observed. Yet another set of workshops focused on helping budding chefs from various places in Punjab.
• Nutritious Kitchen Garden (setting up PoshanVatikas) intervention has been carried out in two villages – Pandwala (SAS Nagar) and Bagh Sikander (Fatehgarh Sahib). The target group was school students and rural women. The intervention was carried out using various knowledge sharing practises such as lectures, demonstrations, participatory activities revolving around three aspects – nutritional, operational, and commercial.