Kudumbam means family in Tamil, and it is the name of the Trichy-based organisation in Tamil Nadu (South India) where I will spend the next five months for an internship. The atmosphere within the organisation is very friendly and I have been feeling like home since the start!
Kudumbam is an NGO working for sustainable rural development through organic agriculture and empowerment of women and children. This is done in several ways; on a grass root level by trainings for small and marginalized farmers, by running a home for children, and by taking part of local and international networks for advocacy and lobbying. I am here through the Swedish network Future Earth of which Kudumbam is a member.
On my very first day in Trichy there was a lot of action! Kudumbam was organizing an activity together with one of the mayor universities in the city to celebrate the International Women Farmers Day and the World Food Day. The event was hold at the Department of Women Studies at the Bharathidasan University, and Kudumbam had brought female farmers from the villages where they are working, who spoke about their experiences of changing into organic farming. Mr Oswald Quintal and Mrs Poppy John, both from Kudumbam, also spoke about the situation women farmers are facing today in Southern India, and about the importance of choosing climate resilient crops, which often means traditional seed varieties that are drought and flood tolerant. Kudumbam also launched its new edition of a Millet Recipe Book, which is part of their program to promote the consumption of different types of millet. All speeches where held in Tamil, but luckily there was a lady in the audience who where able to translate it into English for me. At the end of the day Kudumbam had organized a food stall where they sold tasty millet dishes, and there was a big crowd of students and other visitors buying the food and recipe books. There also came some journalists from local newspapers and a TV-station, and to my surprise I was in the Tamil newspaper the next morning!
Oswald Quintal, director of Kudumbam, later told me that the organization has been working with small and marginalized farmers in Tamil Nadu since 1982. They started working mainly with male farmers, but over the years they have noticed that female farmers have been responding better to the trainings in organic farming, being more willing to incorporate water conservation strategies, and to cultivate drought tolerant crops like millet instead of rice, and phasing out chemical pesticides. Kudumbam has also conducted studies showing that women make 80% of the agricultural work, but in spite of this they are not considered as farmers and often lack the land rights. Therefore the organization is now mainly focusing on small-scale female farmers, and I am looking forward to learn more about the work!
