Grant Awarded to Give Foundation, Haritika

Haritika works with people whose lives are dominated by extreme poverty, illiteracy, disease and other handicaps. With multifaceted development interventions, Haritika strives to bring about positive change in the quality of life of the poor people of Bundelkhand, India.

Bundelkhand region is presently classified as a region with low agro-productivity, that has a lack of sustainable livelihood sources, a low literacy rate, recurring drought and stagnant economic growth. Agriculture has decreased due to the low yield, degrading soil, low aquifer level and low water retaining capacity that is due to rock and sudden climatic variation. This has lead to diseased livestock, lack of proper treatments, decreased human health, a weakening economy and frequent death/droughts. The proposed grant will benefit the two villages of ChakRamsagar and Nichroli of the district Datia MadhyaPradesh, India. Haritika is working with various intuitions to research the issues of Natural Resource Management, Agriculture and allied business support. This is to improve the productivity and sustainability of fruit and vegetable productions systems that meet market demand. In addition, they aim to develop new approaches to human capital development that is driven by technology dependent economic opportunity and entrepreneurship within the horticultural sector in various villages. These programs also help with workshops for training. A mobile based program for dissemination to farmers to help boost productivity, diversify crops and vary income. In rural production areas, a network of agro-entrepreneurs is setup to help the farmer with crop inputs and ICT based advisory for growing nutrient rich crops. For model vegetable farms, it is used for renewable energy, creation of model school, fruit orchard development and agriculture resource tools.

The project proposed will ensure improvement in the life of women and children’s education. The project will decrease cases of water-related diseases by 50%. Other health impacts specific to women include a reduction in urinary infections, reduced incidence of back pain by not having to carry water long distances, reduced mental stress, and less sick infants. The project will decrease the amount of time women spend collecting water. They’ll be reduced from 1-2 hours to 15-20 minutes. This will allow women to pursue other activities such as farming. This will result in a much better and sustainable life for women and their families.