The Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) has signed two memoranda of understanding — with the Grassroots Innovation Augmentation Network (GIAN) and with Arpan Seva Sansthan of Udaipur, Rajasthan — to promote grassroots innovation, traditional knowledge, technology dissemination and sustainable agriculture.

The GIAN agreement was signed in the presence of Dr M. L. Jat, secretary of DARE and director general of ICAR; Dr Rajbir Singh, deputy director general for agricultural extension; Prof. Anil K. Gupta, formerly of IIM Ahmedabad, vice-chairman of GIAN and founder of the National Innovation Foundation; and ICAR assistant directors general Ranjay K. Singh, R. R. Burman and Anil Kumar.

The five-year collaboration is to give a structured framework for identifying, documenting, validating and mainstreaming grassroots innovations and the traditional ecological knowledge of farmers, farm women, rural youth, artisans and other knowledge holders through the Krishi Vigyan Kendra network. Planned activities include a national initiative on farmers' innovations for climate resilience, RAWE-based Mini-Shodh and Prayog Yatras, sentinel villages and village knowledge registers, integration of co-created knowledge into agricultural education, conservation of agrobiodiversity and inclusive value chains.

The partners will also explore a PhD programme on 'Meeting the Unmet and Unfelt Needs: Inclusive Development through Innovations for and from Grassroots' and a Global Academy on Grassroots Innovations and Functional Traditional Knowledge.

The second MoU, with Arpan Seva Sansthan, covers dissemination of proven agricultural technologies, improved crop varieties and extension support, with capacity-building in climate-resilient agriculture, natural resource management, watershed development and integrated farming systems, farmer–scientist interfaces, technology demonstrations and documentation of best practices to improve last-mile delivery. Both agreements draw on ICAR's research and extension network and its KVKs to turn innovations, traditional knowledge and proven technologies into locally relevant solutions.

Source: ICAR