At the Centre for Environment Concerns, an NGO based in Hyderabad, India, the challenge was clear: develop an inclusive irrigation technology suitable for low rainfall areas. Alongside farmers and female farm labourers, they developed a system that provides assured moisture directly to the plant root zone. Initial trials show two...

The biggest challenge we face now is the limited awareness of ecological practices and lack of land for smallholders. We are very much against the current push for hybrids and GMOs and the dependence that comes with them. Thus we call upon our government to declare Tanzania free of such...

We have been talking about women in agriculture – that they are important to farming, that they perform around 50% of the farming activities, despite having less access to resources and technical inputs. And we have been discussing this for more than three decades…with very little being done for them....

Expressing concern over distortion of the credit culture in agriculture, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has written to the government, urging it not to give subsidy for the sector to banks and, instead, provide it directly to farmers.

 Women in Asia are, in most cases, the farmers. But more than that, they are concerned about the nutrition of their families. There are actually more women interested in the models of agriculture that support diversity and nutrition. There are many cases of women who are fighting for land, particularly...

Women from small and marginal farming families doing SRI have been making the news in India for their adoption of a new approach that challenges the age-old beliefs and practices of rice farming. However, rarely one comes across mention of the impact of SRI on their wellbeing and their bodies.  ...

The workshop titled, ICSF-BOBLME India (East Coast) Workshop on Implementing the FAO Voluntary Guidelines for Securing Sustainable Small-scale fisheries in the Context of Food Security and Poverty Eradication (SSF Guidelines) was organized by ICSFin collaboration with BOBLME project.The workshop was the third in a series of consultations held in 2015...

Eyes on Their Finger Tips deals with the traditional marine wisdom of a set of people and the rarest of rare experiences they have had at sea. Through these numerous chapters he takes us into the seas of the fishers. It is a voyage which we cannot make in reality....

This report is the outcome of a series of six fishworkers’ consultations, organised to discuss the relevance and implementation of FAO’s Small-Scale Fisheries Guidelines (SSF Guidelines), and my sincere thanks are due to the fishers and fishworkers - both men and women - who attended the consultations in Kakinada (Andhra...

In the wake of the food crises of the early 1970s and the resulting World Food Conference of 1974, a group of innovators realized that food security depends not only on crop production, but also on the policies that affect food systems, from farm to table. The International Food Policy...

Due to this underlying need, FAO, in collaboration with ICRISAT, ICARDA, and CIAT, organized an expert consultation workshop in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in December 2013 on Community Seed Production. The workshop’s objective was to create a roadmap and develop strategies for enhancing effective uptake and implementation of CSP in developing...

The Kerala State provides a different picture of the success of women in farming. Collective power of women groups, integration of local self governments and proactive credit schemes have enabled landless women to emerge as commercial organic farmers in Kerala. Women are now visible as major farmers in the State,...

Organised into a collective, 30-odd women farmers in a remote tribal hamlet in West Bengal have not only gained necessary skills on agriculture, but have also learned leadership qualities. Gradually, these women are discovering themselves as decision makers not only in their respective families, but also in their villages.

Cet ouvrage a pour objectif d’expliquer la nature et la force des liens entre la famille et l’exploitation agricole. L’ouvrage est construit autour d’une vingtaine d’études de cas menées dans divers pays de l’Asie, de l’Afrique, de l’Amérique latine et de l’Europe. Les auteurs précisent « ce qui fait famille »,...

More and more people are moving towards urban areas for various reasons. This has also increased the demand for food while putting pressure on scarce resources. Urban life styles and food preferences also influence the type of food grown and the way it is grown to meet the growing urban...

This report explores evidence and insights from five case studies that have made significant recent progress in addressing the challenge of insuring poor smallholder farmers and pastoralists in the developing world. In India, national index insurance programmes have reached over 30 million farmers through a mandatory link with agricultural credit...

Agriculture the backbone of Indian economy that engages more than 50 percent of the country’s workforce, is losing its preference as the most desired profession. Research shows that more than 40 percent of farmers dislike farming as a profession because of low profits, high risk, and lack of social status,...

India currently has several public and private active information and communication technology (ICT) initiatives with objectives to support and provide assistance to farmers, but analysis on how ICT is helping farmers to enhance productivity, better cope with the weather variability, and attain better prices for their produce is limited. Information...

The idea of a ‘good farmer’ who adheres to scientific methods of crop production and produces high yields was commonly articulated by scientists and some farmers in Malwa, central India, while evaluating soybean farming. However, through detailed ethnographic description of the everyday practices of soybean farmers in Malwa, this paper...

"This booklet is aimed to educate and inform farmers about diverse possibility of sustainable and safe food production methods and its techniques. This handbook is designed as a practical guide to these different practices of agroecology and their specific principles, techniques and strategies.We hope that these practical techniques would help...