For smallholder farmer Sika Kropi, her backyard garden in Assam’s Karbi Anglong District never looked so significant as it appears now. During a lockdown when her family income was severely constrained, the local vegetables from her backyard and paddy became the regular part of their family meal. “I had enough food from my backyard garden and the fields during this challenging time,” she said.

Sika Kropi’s husband, who used to work in Nagaland also could not save his job and came back to his village. All the economic activities were at standstill and every livelihood option was ceased. The situation was only saved by her vegetables grown in her backyard and the paddy from the field. Local Brinjal, Chili, ladyfinger, pumpkin, Bottle gourd and beans were her routine food items during the lockdown.

The lockdown has left millions unemployed and stranded. It has also raised the much larger concern of food and nutritional security of the most vulnerable.

In a rapid survey, Facilitating Agricultural Regeneration Measures (FARM) North East program of Caritas India revealed encouraging results of resilience and food security. In a situation when food production and supply was greatly hampered, the small farmers of FARM NE villages were self-sufficient in taking care of their food and families.

Funded by Misereor, Germany, the program was initiated seven year’s back and now in its third phase. It focusses on working with the myriad ethnic communities towards attaining food sovereignty by involving them to strengthen their traditional form of agriculture while taking care of the market and socio-economic status. The programme also talked about promoting and preserving the Traditional Ecological Knowledge present among the communities. FARM has seen its target families working closely and promoting the idea of People Led Development (PLD). PLD approach has been the soul of FARM and the programme has community deciding and taking action for their common good while Caritas India with her partners took the role of facilitators.

The sudden outbreak of the Covid 19 global pandemic took the world by surprise and affected humans causing millions of deaths. Lockdowns, migrations, and loss of jobs made lives more miserable. The never say no mantra of Caritas India led her to reach out to the millions in the country with humanitarian support.

Food security of the smallholders in North East India has been one of the top priorities of Caritas India. Caritas through various interventions has been instrumental in helping rural communities to strengthen their food security. Caritas India with a mandate to reach out to the smallholders in improvising their livelihood options has been working with several cluster level programmes in the country addressing the issues and challenges of the smallholders.

The issue of food security especially during the national lockdown loomed large and affected people. Given the unprecedented disaster hitting hard on food security, a random survey was carried out by the Programme Associate, NE zone to assess the status of food security was carried on the previous FARM villages. The survey was carried out in the FARM phase II areas with a sample size of 20 households in each village during July-August 2019. A total sample size of 300 samples was taken into consideration to make the assessment. The questionnaire developed carried responses from random target families covered under the FARM programme.

Rapid Survey

The rapid survey revealed facts that were encouraging especially during the troubled times of the pandemic. Given the fact that the food security of the poor was jeopardized with the onset of Covid 19, this rapid survey showed that the communities from the FARM programme intervention areas showed resilience and build upon food security. Caritas India’s hard work of working with the communities paid dividends when the survey reflected that the target communities were able to survive through the disaster. The core focus was not just implementing or supporting a programme but to ensure that the interventions of that programme sustain.

Close to 52% of the target community had food stocks during the lockdown and this did not stop here as the promotion of PLD was equally reflected when these families reached out to the needy in their respective villages with food stock.

The source of available food was showing a staggering 67.8% of the target families deriving food from their own farms. This goes a long way to establish the fact that due to the programme interventions, the target communities have been able to work towards food sovereignty. The interventions leading to such a promising situation has been made possible through the constant efforts of Caritas India with her partners in facilitating improved agricultural practices and creating farmer resource persons as one of many other innovative practices.

Saving money was not popular among the communities in the region as they did not have much access to the banks and financial institutions. The FARM programme while facilitating the core idea of food sovereignty also focused on family-level savings out of the income they do in groups from various activities. This intervention helped the community to some extent to save money and this money came in handy during the pandemic.

It was important to know whether our project intervention helped the communities to be prepared to face any eventualities and as reflected, the figure was encouraging.

Caritas India along with the communities learned lessons from the global pandemic. Such unprecedented events have changed the narrative for the world and taught us how our programme interventions should be designed in order to cope up with the harsh and unexpected realities. Caritas India appreciates the efforts made by the implementing partners as these efforts have gone a long way to serve the smallholders.