Re-imagining the Future ideas

I was joyful to stay at Tata Institute of social sciences (TISS), Tuljapur campus during my recent field visit at Osmanabad district to see emerging producer companies in the region. I have very good discussion with faculty members particularly Ramesh Jare, Narwade, social worker Ganesh Chadre and students. We talked about agriculture crisis in context of failure of farmer’s organisations, agriculture marketing and drought situation in the region.

While delivering a talk for social entrepreneurship and Rural Development students, I expressed my thoughts on Institutional innovation for farmers and interventions at village level value addition.  I also shared experiences of my recent visits at Israel and Vietnam with respect to agriculture and rural development. I found that young generation is quite interested to explore the possibilities of setting up institutions for the farmers and to design its business model. During Q&A session, I stressed on ‘idea generation’.  I linked ‘idea with change’ in following manner.

“Strong observation power is required to generate an idea.

Generated idea is nurtured by spirited and passionate people.

And spirited and passionate people are the real change makers”.

 I came to know about various interventions by TISS in the agriculture and social enterprises like “SAMADHAN” initiative which is one stop solution for the villagers to disseminate the knowledge through technology as well as a service provider. After this knowledge sharing, one idea came in mind that ‘Can TISS become an institutional synergy partner of farming community to lead producer company movement like Gokhale Institute of Economics and Politics nurtured co-operative movement in the past? ‘ I put forth simple observation  that - TISS Canteen requires 70-80 litres of milk per day which is procured from some agency at the rate of Rs. 40 per Litre and Milkman in the neighbouring villages are selling their milk at Rs 15-18 per litre.  These simple comments lead a group of students to develop an idea of linking milkman directly to TISS canteen.   

Gramdut’s of TISS working in the area of energy informed us that NASA declared this region best for harvesting solar energy due to its geographical location. On the basis of this fact a group of young people is working on idea of collecting equity from the farmers  to run a  clean energy and to give them assured income though small capital investment in the  projects.  We were fortunate to see Ambedkar sugar factory’s 1 MW solar power station while going to Padoli village.

Padoli village is 30 kms away from Osmanabad. Mr. Deepak Pawar from the village worked on idea of setting up farmer Producer Company in the village. Due to this idea Padoli village is    emerging as a new hub for the floriculture and recently “Padoli” variety of Gerbera is released. This village has done remarkable work to achieve water security through Jalyukt Shivar Abhiyan.   His energy and spirit showcased ability and determination of dryland farmers in Osmanabad to build and run an organisation. 

I strongly consider that Re-imagining the Future ideas along with innovations and interventions by change makers is the need of the hour.

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