GiftsShare:
It has been ten months since you participated in the 2009 Artemis Great Kindrochit Quadrathlon and raised a fantastic £170,000 for Mercy Corps work in India. Initially Mercy Corps had planned to use the funds raised to improve working conditions of tea workers by purchasing a tea estate to be run in conjunction with the community. We have, unfortunately, been unsuccessful in our efforts to purchase a tea estate, in competition, on the open market, but it does remain a long term objective. In order to assure that your funds reach tea estate communities and start improving lives immediately, the money you raised will be directed into a new strand of CHAI (Community Health Advancement Initiative)our already well established project within the Darjeeling tea growing communities in India.
Photo: e christie
CHAI works closely with local communities in the Darjeeling and Assam regions to identify and address common problems to improve quality of life through health, economic development and youth initiatives. It currently works in 150 communities with approximately 85,000 residents.
Building on our experience working with agricultural and trading communities, we are now seeking to further improve living standards for small holder farmers by enabling the provision of market information using mobile phone technology to drive improved production and trading capability.
Problem Statement
Rural Darjeeling with its population of 1.5 million is mostly dependent on agriculture and related activities for their livelihood, 85% are small and marginal farmers. Traditionally the farmers had learned to diversify their produce for maximum land usage and to absorb crop failures and market shocks, the main products were ginger, cardamom, turmeric, potatoes and oranges complemented with livestock rearing. In recent years farmers have not received adequate benefits from agriculture and dairy and consequently household activities have reduced leading to loss of income. Many farmers have totally given up growing crops like cardamom and ginger due to crop loss and market fluctuations. Farmers have had no access to finance to invest in better quality inputs like seeds, fodder, nor the means for receiving price related information.
Key Challenges
Photo: Thatcher Cook for Mercy Corps
Farmers failing to adapt to production challenges like the availability of raw materials and the ability to identify and solve key market constraints.
Lack of access to credit has prevented farmers from investing in quality raw materials and prevented them from improving and expanding their production.
Lack of linkage and market information to get the right price for their products. Those who are able to produce are often exploited by loan sharks with high interest rates and middlemen who set prices barely above the production costs.
Moving Forward- Market Chain Intervention
In its last 5 years of working within the community Mercy Corps has identified spices (ginger, cardamom, turmeric) and dairy as some potential livelihood activities in the communities that can increase income and employment opportunities for households. The Market Chain Intervention (MCI) will focus on addressing the financial, technical and market constraints of spice and dairy farmers in Darjeeling. MCI will manage its own credit funds, link with government and non government institutes for technical and input support and the use of mobile phone network for market information.
MCI Goal-To improve participation of market actors ( producers, wholesalers, retailers) in the spice and dairy market chains resulting in value added benefits to households through diversification and increased income.
MCI Objectives and Outputs
Objective1: To improve and diversify 1000 households' sources of income from spice and dairy production, value addition and marketing.
Key Outputs:
900 farmers access financial credit and technical services for increasing production.
80 collectors/middlemen access financial, technical and business support for setting and managing value addition units.
20 wholesalers supported for higher value addition (if required) packaging, branding and marketing.
Objective2: To introduce a market based information system through mobile phone technology for market actors particularly the primary producers (farmers)
Key Outputs:
Establishment of Darjeeling Mobile Market Management, a network based system to disseminate comparative price and related information on farmers produces.
2000 producers and traders access regular standard price information resulting in fair process and market choices..
MCI Strategy
Communities will be selected based on the households' activity portfolio, past credit history and interest in participating in the programme. Farmers will be mobilised to form
Farmers groups based on their primary produces. The groups will avail trainings and bulk purchase inputs.
Farmers will be formed into Joint Liability Groups consisting of 3-5 members and credit products will be designed for these groups. Mercy Corps will set up its own credit services since no other service provider exists in these areas. Mercy Corps already has a credit operation in Assam and will adapt it to meet the needs of Darjeeling.
Expand and revive production of crops and milk through improved training and guidance, linkages to quality inputs, protection techniques and introduction to greenhouse technology.
Introduce post harvest processing and packaging of the finished products. The farmers will be trained to adopt post harvest preservation techniques and middlemen/collectors will be encouraged to set up packaging units. Such interventions will eliminate monopoly of middlemen.
Collaborate with mobile phone companies to use their network to disseminate regular comparative market spices through sms to member farmers.
Link with local and export markets. Leverage with spice board and Chamber of Commerce for assistance in marketing spices.
Photo: mercy corps
MCI Impact,
With the expansion and diversification of household incomes through market information, loans and agricultural extension, the project will generate sustainable employment on three levels of value chain- production, collection and processing. The project will target 2000 households in 3 years. The success of the project will be measured by:
% of farmers diversifying and improving household income.
Number of farmers subscribing to the mobile linkage service.
% of value addition units running profitably.
Conclusion
85% of Darjeeling farmers have small and marginal landholdings. With rising population and unemployment, maximum usage of land and optimum cost benefit for production is the way forward to reduce poverty. This project proposes to introduce modern technologies to improve production and also better access to markets. The immediate benefits will reach at least 2000 households in three years while another 5000 households will be benefitted because of the ripple affect.
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