Sandeep Narayan Jamjade is a farmer residing in Jalochi Village, Baramati, Pune. He is 37 years old with a family of 11. He started his farming venture when he was 24.    It took him years of trial and error to adopt various practical solutions leading to ecologically sustainable agricultural practices.

Though Sandeep’s ancestral family has been practicing farming for more than 40 years, he started doing full time farming after he lost his contractual job as a labour in the year 2007. He struggled for many years to make his ends meet with low yield of crops and poor quality of soil. Due to unavailability of proper guidance, his farming practices were mainly restricted to mono cropping of maize cultivation which yielded him approx. INR 1000/- per ton for 50 tons per season. Also, to add to it the nutritionally challenged soil wasn’t helping much, while,  majority of the income coming from his maize produce was getting invested in purchasing fertilisers, insecticides and pesticides for his farm, further depleting the existing nutrients from his land.

He had no idea as to how to improve the soil quality of his farms till he attended one of the free  seminars conducted by SankalpTaru Foundation after getting registered as one of its farmer beneficiaries in the year 2018. He was introduced to the organisation through his cousin who has been a farmer beneficiary since 2016.