Ramachandran K G
Three new community managed nurseries have been set up in three different villages in the Nilambur area. The nursery in Cherupzha is managed by a community foundation, called ‘Thoduve’. The second nursery has been set up at Palakkayam and the third one is at Appankappu village. The responsibility of the management of these two nurseries lies with the respective FRA Gramasabhas in the settlement. The Gramasabha has entrusted the responsibility of regular monitoring and maintenance of the nurseries to the Forest Rights Committee (FRC) members. None of the community members in these settlements had any experience in maintaining nurseries. In this scenario, the community members were in needed to develop an understanding of basic nursery management techniques. Training was organized for these members on 21st March, 2021 on different techniques of nursery management and it was held at Cherupuzha community resource Centre. 28 participants belonging to four different communities (Aranadan, Paniya, Kattunaicken and Muthuva) from Appankkappu, Bhoomikuth, ettappara, narangapoyil, kottuppara, Palakkyam, Neerpuzhamukkam villages participated in this one day training program.
The training focused on the preparation of mother bed for different kinds of plants like coffee, tubers, vegetables and other crops, the selection of the seeds, seasonal management etc. A special session on tuber crops was organized as part of the training. Mr. Saneesh of Keystone foundation presented about different kinds of tubers in this session. He explained why the tubers are important and how it is a crop for the future. He taught them about the methods of raising the tuber crops in the nurseries.
