Meeting of Using Diversity (Western Ghats) and Exposure visit to Joida Tuber Festival – 18th and 19th December 2018

18^th December 2018

Introductory session

Participants introduced themselves to all in the first session before the lunch. There were 28 participants in the meeting including the community members, project fellows and project advisors from the different project areas namely Pillur (Tamil Nadu), Nilambur and Mananthavady (Kerala), Periyapatna, Sirsi and Joida (Karnataka) and Sindhudurg (Maharashtra). 

Field visits

The participants were divided into two groups and visited two Kunbi community villages in the project areas to interact with community members and to understand their traditional agricultural practices and dependence on forest resources.

Reflections of participants on the field visits:

“There are some new varieties of tubers found in the village we visited. Three to four types of tubers were very different and I have seen them for the first time in my life” – Lakshmi, Siddi, Sirsi

“Land and agriculture practices are very different from my home village in Tamil Nadu.  This is a completely different landscape. We rarely cultivate rice in the area of  Pillur, but here rice seems to be the major crop. Houses are bigger here and some of them are really old. The climate is also very different.  Surprisingly, similar house construction patterns were once found in my community villages also.” – Chandran, Erula, Tamil Nadu

“I have been to a 300 hundred year old village where there are 22 families with around 126 members living there. The young generation are educationally forward and are employed in some good office jobs. It was a surprise for me that there are no plastics and villagers keep neatness.  The community cultivate paddy in 60 acres of land and they cultivate about 3 kinds of millet varieties also. The area I visited is rich in bio-diversity. The older generation shows the way to the new people and the culture is very visible here.  People are also very welcoming” – Shaji NM, Mananthavady, Kerala

“The village set up seemed same as in our villages, but water availability seems high here as compared to our villages. There are more monkeys in my place, but wild boar population seems to be more here” – Uday Aair Lawoo, Sidhudurg, Maharashtra

“The soil is good for agriculture here in the village I visited as compared to the soil of the farm lands in our area.” – Geetha, Siddi, Sirsi

“People are self sufficient here, they farm everything that they want for their consumption” – Sunil Kumar, Paniya, Kerala

“Rupees 100 is enough for living here. People are self reliant and this is the message I need to carry back to people with whom I work” – Ashakumari, Sahaja Samrudha

Interaction of participants with organisers of the Joida tuber mela to be held on 19^th December 2018

The Joida tuber mela which was to be held on 19^th December 2018 is well known for its uniqueness and it attracts many enthusiasts and researchers to Joida, a small village town in North Karnataka. The participants of the UD Meeting (Western Ghats) got to interact with some of the organisers of the mela as well as the Chief Guest.

Mr. Balachandra Hegde explained how the Tuber mela started at Joida. He said that the idea of organizing such an event sparkled 5 years ago, when he visited a Kunbi village for the first time. People here are independent even if they are remote in a popular sense. He was given to eat a variety of tubers with honey at the time of visit. It was a delicious experience and the taste of the tubers lead to the idea of the need for introducing them to the world. Thus, Joida tuber mela was begun.

Jayanad, a member of Kunbi community, is one of the chief coordinators of the Tuber fest, and he shared his experiences with respect to teh Mela – “I did not have any idea about the diversity of tubers until some researchers came and discussed with us. There were around 80 farmers attending when we organised the tuber fest for the first time here. This event has given many new concepts and ideas to our people who belong to the Kunbi Community. Possibilities of developing different tuber based food items were one of the ideas to come out after the first fest. We could also find out opportunities of exploring value addition of tuber products. Widely received Media attention has also helped to increase the interest among farmers to take part in the Mela. The numbers of farmers participating increased from 80 to114 farmers in the second year. 26 different varieties of tubers were exhibited in the second tuber mela. The Kunbi community have also received a national award of plant genome saviour as a community.”

Interaction with Chief Guest Shaji N.M., National Award winner (Plant Genome Saviour)

Mr. Shaji is a farmer from Wayanad district of Kerala who has received several awards in the field of agriculture both at the national and state level. He has been invited to inaugurate the Tuber Mela organized at Joida for this year of 2018.

Shaji exhibited a movie on his farmland called ‘Kedaram’. After this six minute documentary film, he briefly explained about how he started preserving the tubers on his land. He replied to some of the questions from the participants as follows:

• He was attracted to the field of agriculture while he was working as a volunteer for Pain and Palliative Care initiatives in Manathavady. His understanding that the deviation from traditional dietary habits has led to different diseases including dangerous cancers, caused him to go back to his parents’ profession of agriculture at the age of 28. Gradually, he realized that his grandparents and the tribal folk around him were depending on tubers for their survival in the past.
• The diversities and options of tuber crops as food attracted him and then he started collecting seeds of tubers from wherever he went. He has also made some special travels to different places in the state and different parts of the country in search for new varieties of tubers to grow in his garden. At present, he keeps about 202 different indigenous varieties of tubers on his farmland.
• One hundred and two different varieties of indigenous tubers on his farmland have been verified by the scientists of Kerala Agriculture University and the documentation of this tuber diversity lead to him receiving the national award.

19^th December 2018

The participants first visited the Joida tuber festival organised by the Kunubi community people of Joida Taluk at Joida town. Hundreds of farmers from the community came and exhibited the tubers they cultivated in their farms. The Festival was inaugurated by Shaji N.M.National award winner (Genome Saviour Award) from Mananthavady with him the participants had interacted on the 18^th of December.

Planning session

After lunch, the participants sat down  to discuss about the future plan of  the project and an overview of  the inputs from the participants is as follows:

• Field level future planning has to be done – community members have to decide on what kind of support they need and UD fellows have to explore this in this beginning on January 2019.
• More emphasis has to be given to forest rights related trainings. The organizations and most of the community members are not having basic knowledge on forest rights so that training is necessary on FRA. Passive approach rather than an activist approach is desirable in realizing the rights for the community (Suggestion from Sahaja).
• Field exchange visits – Inter field exchange programs was a suggestion offered by the participants. It would give the fellows and community persons an opportunity to learn about the practices in other parts of the region.
• Documentation process – some of the community members are not skilled enough to document according to the datasheets provided. They need more training or capacity building in documentation of project implementation.

 

Final session- feed back of UD participants on tuber fest and program

Puvi – “This exposure was a different experience for me. Tuber nursery is included in my plan for next year.”

Raveena – “Exchange of knowledge on tubers and wild food is a good idea for the future.”

Uday – “Have only consumed and learned that there is potential for sale”

Geetha – “Film shown by Shaji has given more knowledge on tubers and we have to organize a local tuber mela at my village”

Chandran – “Field visits helped a lot to understand about the tubers.”

Sunilkumar – “Never heard about such Tuber mela and all experiences shared by participants were big learning in my life.”

Pandu Hegde – “All sessions were very participatory and engaging”