Adivasi women self help cooperative/s

The adivasi women’s stall no 124 at the Adivasi Mela 2010 sold Rs. 12,321.00 on the first day (26.1.2010). The leaders of Gayatridevi Women Self Help Cooperative(GWSHC), Sindhibadi, Malkangiri couldn’t believe their produces could sale to this volume in the single day. Being new to doing business at a city they were debating the acceptance of their products by the city dwellers. The five adivasi women from Malkangiri were re-counting their journey from the non-descript village in Malkangiri (about 650kms from Bhubaneswar ) when they could hardly get Rs. 400 per quintal of finger millet & Rs. 400 per quintal of Paddy. This was also a prize for some and many struggle to sale their paddy and had to wait for months to get the money.

Over the fifteen days of the Adivasi Mela the total sale volume of the samabaya reached to Rs. 1,12,000.00. They had sold aromatic rice varieties, brown rice, thin rice, turmeric, honey, pearl millet, little millet, foxtail millet, finger millet, suan, kangu, janha, horse gram, dry rice balls, amla squash, herbs from the forest, black gram, green gram, etc.

The adivasi women in the grampanchayats of Markapalli & Biralaxmanpur of Malkangiri tribal development block are like any other adivasi women living in abject isolation and poverty. During 2002 the local ICDS project had formed their Self Help Groups in the villages and the women were called to a handful of meeting. After that nothing came on their way till 2006 when these groups were facilitated to explore opportunities. Organisation for Rural Reconstruction & Integrated Social Service Activities (ORRISSA) while promoting Village Development Committees in these villages have also encouraged these women groups to add value. The women groups realized the need of getting a fair price to their agriculture and forest produces (Non timber) as the traders coming to the villages and to the local weekly markets were procuring materials in assumed volume. Initially these groups were encouraged to procure weighing machines in the villages so that the households especially the women folks would get to know the weight of the materials they want to sale. The leaders of these groups were also given orientation to maintain their group records and interact with government and bank officials. The groups however, still find it difficult to fetch a fair price for their produces.

At this point ORRISSA encouraged the groups to forge tie and form a Self Help Cooperative. The cooperative with only 51 members got registered during 2008. The households were also encouraged to retain their traditional crops and agriculture systems. Over this period the membership of the cooperative have reached to 112 adivasi women spread over four grampanchayats of Malkangiri tribal development block of Malkangiri district.

However, Champa Majhi, Secretary of GWSHC sharing her experience have stated that, they were not aware of the acceptance of their produces (most aromatic rice and millets) by the urban consumers. During the last two years her family had sold five quintals of aromatic rice (completely organic) and the average rate per kilogram of rice was Rs. 22.00 which is almost double the amount the family had sold earlier. However, this was not the first time the women cooperative had organized their marketing stall. They have been doing this type of work since last two years and have helped more than 50 adivasi households to regularly sale their produces with a higher price through the cooperative.

The stall at Adivasi Mela 2010

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