Of late jhum (shifting cultivation) has been considered as a painstaking effort by the farmers due to its reduced cycle of 1 & 2 years over the years and is attributed to the low soil fertility due to various factors induced by climate change. Babu Teron, a jhum farmer from Karbi Anglong District of Assam has made a difference in his cultivation practices and stockpiled his granary from time to time with paddy, millets and other seasonal crops during COVID-19.

When the rest of the world was struggling for food, Babu stood tall and ensured that his family has enough food during the nation-wide lockdown triggered by the pandemic. He has become an inspiration to show the potential of empowered rural communities to cope with the crisis.

Jhum is a diversified agricultural system that helps farmers to ensure food security by growing a host of food crops with paddy and millets as the major crops. Farmers like Babu has proved this notion true with their hard work and enthusiasm. Babu also helped his neighbours and villagers with food supply when it was needed the most.

He was a part of the Caritas India’s Facilitating Agricultural Regeneration Measures (FARM) North East Phase II programme supported by Misereor Germany which promotes traditional farming practices which are more sustainable and more efficient to meet the food and nutrition security needs of tribal communities. Implemented by Jirsong Asong, a Diocesan partner in Assam, the program has helped farmers to scale up cultivation practices in jhum fields.

COVID-19 had a silver lining as it has revealed the glaring examples of farmers self-reliance from its intervention areas to ensure food security during the crisis. The second phase of FARM Northeast had 200 villages covering 12,093 families with a population of 63,656. FARM programme had promoted sustainable traditional agricultural practices as one of its major objectives. Farmers covered under this phase came forward to cultivate with indigenous seeds after having realized its importance in addressing the nutritional demands.

“We have identified Babu a role model for the farmers under FARM phase III and Babu is happily extending his support to fellow farmers to strengthen their food security,” shared Mondol Teron, Programme Coordinator of Jirsong Asong.

Babu’s wife also followed his step to ensure that the family has some income. She reared silkworms, a promising income generation activity and also practised backyard garden to fulfil the need of fresh vegetable needs of the family.

It’s worth mentioning that the region and its people are woven together with a culture that does not allow anyone to starve, no matter what. This has been a part of the parcel in the ethnic societies of North East Region (NER) and Caritas India has been working in NER to strengthen this notion of oneness among the people in the rural areas.

Caritas India has conducted a random rapid survey in the recently completed FARM Northeast Phase II areas to assess the impact of its intervention, especially during the national lockdown. The survey was conducted with the help of a questionnaire that was supplied to the partners. Twenty farmers each were randomly selected for the interview from the 7 states in NER.

The survey revealed that 51% of the farmers had enough food stocks during the lockdown. This was possible because of farmers like Babu spread across the region under the FARM intervention. This was an encouraging impact that surfaced due to such interventions. FARM Phase II also had around 68% of the families fetching food products from their backyard gardens. These backyard gardens were promoted purely with indigenous seeds by Caritas India’s partners. Caritas India also promoted financial inclusions by connecting the farmers to several government schemes and this resulted in around 73% of families benefitting from such schemes.

Caritas India is known as a humanitarian support organization and such glaring examples from her intervention reaffirms her commitment to help and support the smallholders grow.