What started as an experiment a few years ago has now grown into a thriving kitchen garden with over 10 varieties of vegetables at Jongksha Village of East Khasi Hills, Meghalaya.

The kitchen garden cultivates chemical-free crops of radish, mustard, cabbage, coriander, onion, and beans. The garden also grows wild edible such asJyllang, Jalyntah, Jakhaiñ, Jali and Ja myrdoh which belongs to Ms Shidalang, a member of the Iatreilang SHG at Jongksha Village.

Ms Shidalang has a small store in her village where she sells organic vegetables from her kitchen garden and promotes other farmers by keeping vegetables from their farms. After opening this small store, she could earn up to Rs. 20,000 as of date.

Jongksha Village is one of the program areas of Social Service Centre (SSC) under the Caritas India FARM NE-III program for the last 5 years. SSC has been working hard with the community to bring development and self-reliance. The organization has formed seven groups including Iatreilang SHG at Jongksha Village. The group has been capacitated to cultivate chemical-free farming and sell their products in the monthly farmer’s market.

Ms Shidalang Nongbri attended the exposure visit organised by the FARM NE-III program in Khweng village Ri-Bhoi District on making Berkley Compost. Berkley is a fast & efficient composting technique which produces high-quality compost in 18 days. It has the benefits of killing weed seeds and pathogens (diseases) and breaking down the material into very fine compost.

She took the initiative to teach the members of her group on making Berkley compost as a collective so they can use this manure for cultivation. The group said after using the Berkley compost the vegetables are sprouting and growing so well. Convinced with the outcome of this manure, other farmers in the village want to buy the manure from them. Since the group was making the Berkley compost a smaller quantity they could not fulfil other demands, so they decided to make the Berkley compost in a bigger way so that they can use it not only for themselves but also to sell to others. On 24 of March 2021 this SHG group has set up Berkley compost plant and they have sold for 6 Khoh for 60 rupees per khoh to date. The group continues this process to date as they find it easy to prepare, very useful and also they can generate income.

“I never knew that the training that I received could change the life of the group as they got to sell the manure that she prepared,” says Ms. Shidalang Nongbri. She was inspired to see that Berkeley compost has brought money to generate income for them as a group.

Ms. Debora Pynrope member of the group buy the Berkely compost from the group by using this compost in her garden. She cultivated 10 crops in her kitchen garden and found that the vegetables are sprouting and growing well.

Even during the lockdown, she could pluck the vegetables to fulfil the need of the family member and she got to sell also like cabbage, French beans and carrots. She says that now she has more crops in her kitchen garden because the crops are not the time to pluck. She got like pudina, jamyrdoh, jakhaiñand jyllang for the need in every day in her family. “This technique helped in increasing the revenue and the health of the soil through this compost such as green manure mixed cropping a method of growing more crops in the same land as in a kitchen garden,” Debora said.