ICAR-Central Institute for Women in Agriculture, Bhubaneswar organized training cum demonstration programme on ‘Natural Farming for Sustainable Production, Nutrition and Health for farmwomen’ for 21 farmwomen from 2 adopted villages of the Institute on 17th May 2024. Dr Mridula Devi, Director, ICAR-CIWA in her inaugural address, highlighted the concerns of chemical farming and its impact on health and nutrition of women. She motivated the trainees for keeping a positive attitude towards natural farming and to begin natural farming in their backyard nutrition garden for better health and well-being of farm families. She emphasized to initiate indigenous methods of farming by integrating traditional production practices with innovative approaches, indigenous technological knowledge and local seeds.
Dr Arun Kumar Panda, Head-Gender Family and Community Studies Division and Coordinator of the training cum demonstration delivered a lecture on Natural Farming-Principles and Practices, effect on production, nutrition and health. Dr Laxmi Priya Sahoo, Senior Scientist explained the role of Natural Farming in providing sustainable livelihood to farmwomen. Demonstrations on preparation of Natural Farming components like Jeevamruta, Beejamruta, Panchagavya and Handi khata were organized by Dr Ankita Sahu. An exposure visit was organized to Regional Centre of Organic Farming, Ghatikia, Bhubaneswar, which is a premier Institute for Organic Farming and Natural Farming, where farm women got an exposure of the organic certification procedure, preparation of natural farming inputs and other organic soil enrichment techniques. The training programme comprised of lectures, demonstrations, hand on training and exposure visits. Farmwomen got immensely benefited and gained practical knowledge on various components of natural farming by the training cum demonstration programme and were motivated to initiate natural farming practices in a cluster basis in their farm areas. The training programme was successfully coordinated by Dr Arun Kumar Panda, Dr Laxmipriya Sahoo and Dr Ankita Sahu of ICAR-Central Institute for Women in Agriculture, Bhubaneswar.
Read more: https://icar-ciwa.org.in/index.php/fortabevents/676-ciwa-may17-2024