Maharashtra women farmers navigating drought and inequality

DW (English)

Dharashiv district is notorious for droughts and traditional mindsets. One organization is helping women farmers to negotiate changing weather patterns and patriarchal structures.

Transcript

00:00This is nothing short of a miracle. It rarely rains in the inhospitable areas

00:07of the Dalashiv district of Maharashtra. Nevertheless, the farmers here managed

00:12to grow crops on their fields. They have learned how to do this over the

00:16centuries. For the past 10 years or so, however, there have been repeated and

00:22sudden heavy downpours. So heavy that entire harvests are lost. Sangamitra

00:30Ankushrao lives in Bamni, a village in the district. The work of the 42-year-old

00:35here in the fields is becoming increasingly unpredictable.

00:46This May we were not expecting rainfall to affect our sowing.

00:52We no longer know when to do what. Now we have finished sowing. Still there is no rainfall.

01:06Sugarcane and soybeans are the region's most important crops, but they are sensitive.

01:12The timing of sowing, rainfall and periods during growth have to be right.

01:22Due to the unpredictable weather, Sangamitra's father repeatedly suffered

01:26heavy losses on his fields. He made many mistakes back then, Sangamitra tells us.

01:32We did not know for example that we could use our own homegrown seeds. My father used to buy them. He

01:43also used pesticides and any other profits were spent on buying more seeds. Losses piled up and

01:50any revenue went on purchasing seeds, fertiliser, etc.

02:01Some time ago, Sangamitra took over the work on her father's farm and she has made quite a few

02:06changes. With a seed drill, she can sow the grain faster and more efficiently.

02:16Drip irrigation ensures that the plants get enough water, but never too much.

02:20She built the pond for rain water herself and she got rid of her father's monoculture plantations.

02:30I have adopted the sari technique. There are three types of crops and I am growing gawar,

02:35mirchi, shepu and mansari line. These are three useful crops.

02:41The soybeans were lost in the heavy rains two years ago,

02:45but the yields from other crops helped her get through the year. She does not use pesticides

02:51and makes her own fertiliser. Sangamitra learned everything she knows from

03:01Soayam Shikshan Prayog or SSP for short. This grassroots women's empowerment organisation has

03:09been working to promote women's rights for more than 20 years. In workshops lasting several weeks,

03:15women learn the basics of sustainable agriculture. This is traditional farming and includes predicting

03:22weather patterns based on animal behaviour.

03:28If birds make their nest high in the tree, then it means there will be less rain.

03:32When they nest lower down, it means there will be heavy rains.

03:37In addition, women here are taught basic economic skills, knowledge most of them lack. As in most parts

03:43of India, women here have no right to own land.

03:54We have discovered that 70 to 80 percent of women work on farms from preparation to harvesting.

04:02When the harvest is over, their husbands sell the products in the market.

04:06In the end, the women's profit is zero.

04:17SSP has been helping women for some time now to have their land transferred from their families

04:22to their own names. Here in the district, two percent of women have succeeded in acquiring their own land.

04:29Getting this far has been a slog.

04:31We realized that if women became involved in decision making and generated income,

04:40the whole family would benefit and women would be involved in this way.

04:45So I started telling male farmers in each home,

04:47say you have 10 acres of land, give one acre to her and let her farm it.

04:51So Varna Mote owns her own land. Her husband died in an accident, leaving behind the 30-year-old

05:00and her two children. With the organization's help, she managed, albeit in a roundabout way,

05:06to have two hectares of land owned by her parents-in-law transfer to her own name.

05:12It was clear to her from the outset that she would do things very differently from her husband.

05:17My husband used to grow soybeans and sugarcane.

05:28That required a lot of chemical pesticides and a lot of water.

05:34Suvarna too now cultivates her fields using traditional methods which enable her to better

05:41withstand the uncertainties of climate change. SSP struggles to convince families

05:47and especially men to give part of their land to women. Government programs help in that respect.

06:00It enables women to gain security, while on the other hand, male farmers realize that by giving

06:05their wives land rights, they will receive subsidies and crop insurance.

06:09More than 16,000 women in this region have got their own land thanks to SSP.

06:20And the use of traditional farming methods is helping them better understand

06:24the unpredictability of the unpredictability of climate change.

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