A plus for pulses

The Himmotthan team has spent five years getting its equation right with ‘mission pulses’, educating and training farmers about better varieties of pulses and best practices in cultivation and harvesting, while also providing market linkages for their produce.

Pulses were chosen as the key crop because they grow well in hilly, rain-fed regions. Apart from Pithoragarh, the project area covers villages in the Uttarkashi, Bageshwar, Tehri Garhwal, Pauri Garhwal, Almora, Dehradun, Nainital and Chamoli districts. “The unique climate and terrain of these regions make them ideal for pulses farming,” says Rajendra Koshyari, an area project manager with Himmotthan.

To identify the farmers most in need of support, Himmotthan conducted a survey in 2018. This provided a baseline understanding of geographical and socioeconomic conditions. The exercise helped identify 12 clusters of villages with a high concentration of families living below the poverty line.

Himmotthan then engaged with local communities to understand existing practices and what the farmers needed. Local offices were set up, with field staff interacting directly with farmers.Pulses were already on the menu: locals typically grew rajma, black and white soya bean, rice bean and the like alongside wheat, rice and potato.

‘Mission pulses’ has focused on encouraging farmers to change age-old practices and move to newer methods. These include adopting high-yield and disease-resistant varieties, changing cropping patterns and improving pest management.

In the initial phase, some 6,000 farmers were encouraged to make rajma their star crop. Convincing the farmers to change was a challenge. The Himmotthan team consulted local community leaders and farmer groups to determine which interventions would be most helpful in a given location.

Thereafter, it employed a systematic and layered strategy that comprised substantial capacity building through the setting up of self-help groups (SHGs), cooperatives and community resource centres. There are now a dozen women farmer cooperatives in the programme and about 550 village-based farmers groups.

Multiple training programmes, regular monitoring, follow-up sessions and feedback mechanisms have enabled the building of trust with the community, while ensuring that the inputs delivered are relevant to the needs of the farmers. Setting up a network of community institutions has bolstered the sustainability component of the initiative.

All of these measures have been a boon for the farmers. Average annual income from agriculture has more than doubled from the 2018 baseline (from 12,000 to 38,159). The income increase has been higher in households cultivating rajma crops, which have registered a 79% increase in yield and a six-fold rise in profitability.

Learning the lot

Ms Dhani is one of those farmers. She now grows rajma, amaranthus, potato and vegetables on her 2-acre spread and the shift happened after she joined the mission. “I have learned about modern agricultural techniques, about farmer producer groups, financial management and market access,” she says.

Ms Dhani was trained in better production practices such as bio-composting to improve soil fertility, in sourcing superior onion seeds, and in using vertical nets for rajma cultivation to optimise space and yield. Himmotthan helped with the installation of a water tank for irrigation. Beekeeping is another skill that Ms Dhani has picked up.

Having joined the programme in 2018, Ms Dhani’s annual earnings have doubled from 75,000 to 150,000. “We have been able to educate our children in better schools,” she says. “Two of our children have graduated and our daughter is married. Also, we have opened a small store in our village.”

A critical component of ‘mission pulses’ has to do with market linkages. In 2016, Himmotthan set up the Trishulii Producer Company as an apex body to market agricultural products cultivated by small and marginal farmers from across Uttarakhand. With more than 4,000 members, Trishulii is involved in value-addition processes that increase farmer incomes.

The organisation, which forms the last link in the farm-to-market chain set up by Himmotthan, coordinates closely with farmer groups, aggregates produce and ensures quality standards, turning small-scale agriculture into a profitable venture.

Trishulii has an annual turnover in excess of  20 million and has evolved into a recognised brand, with its products being sold to local retailers, institutional buyers and e-commerce sites (in August 2024, Trishulii launched its Munsyari rajma on Amazon).

The going, and the growing, has been good for ‘mission pulses’, and the future holds the promise of further gains for small farmers at the heart of the effort.