A soil and water conservation project run by ICRISAT and Amazon in Maharashtra's Palghar district has built 97 water-management structures in its first year, creating an estimated 328,900 cubic metres of water-harvesting capacity, the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics said on 21 October.
The initiative, Regenerative Landscape for Transforming Smallholder Agri-Food Systems, covers 1,500 hectares and tackles land degradation, water scarcity and the vulnerability of smallholders through decentralised, community-led management of natural resources. The structures include water surplus structures, farm ponds, masonry tanks and stream deepening. They provide protective irrigation and make a dry-season crop possible.
Together with plant health work, soil nutrient demonstrations and agroforestry, the project has directly benefited about 700 tribal farming families. ICRISAT says these families are expected to harvest more in the coming rabi season, with household incomes expected to rise by about 80 percent; that is a projection, not a measured result.
The first-year milestones were marked at a Farmers' Day on 9 October in Abitgarh village, attended by Daulat Bhika Daroda, member of the Legislative Assembly for the Shahapur constituency, Dr Amol V. Dahiphale, head of the Agricultural Research Station in Palghar, and Dr S. S. Sayyeed, junior agronomist at the station, along with ICRISAT scientists, Amazon officials and the farming families who carried out the work.
Source: ICRISAT
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