Funded by – I. T. C Ltd, Kolkata, West Bengal

Project Duration –  July, 2018- March, 2023

Description-“Transformation of Aspirational Districts Program” has been launched by Government of India on January 2018 which aims to quickly and effectively improve the performance of 25 districts across identified key performance indicators in sectors which improves quality of life and economic productivity in areas like health and nutrition, education, agriculture and water resource management, financial inclusion, skill development and basic infrastructure.

NITI Aayog or The National Institution for Transforming India which was established by the Narendra Modi’s NDA government to replace the Planning Commissionhas partnered with ITC for providing technical support to improve productivity of agriculture and allied sectors in the 25 districts around the country. The prime objective of the partnership increasing net returns from farming through reduction in costs of production and increasing productivity of major crops in each of the identified district.

Activities-

Master Trainer Workshop-

Master Trainer Workshop had been conducted in each of the five districts for both the Kharif as well as Rabi season wherein the different government officials from Agriculture such as Agricultural Development officers (ADOs), Senior ADOs, ATM, BTM had participated in the workshop and the report of each of the following had been submitted.

Farmers Field School

FFS has been set up in 250 villages for the Kharif & Rabi season, using varieties provided by Government of in the five districts of Assam. 875 FFS nursery beds had been prepared and transplanting had been completed followed by top dressing of fertilizers, weeding operations. Flowering in paddy fields had started followed by harvesting operations in the field. The main objective of the programme was to promote line sowing, which are being transplanted in the main field to increase the net returns of the farmers through reduction in costs of production and increasing productivity of major crops in the identified district.

Farmers Training & Scheme Awareness

1, 86,206 farmers have been trained in the five districts regarding Kharif and Rabi season covering the aspects right from seed selection to the harvesting process. Also 1247 farmers had been given  awareness on different government schemes.

Rampur project

A new project on “Sustainable livelihood resources Tulda- Jaati bamboo and Agriculture” started in the Rampur area of Kamrup (R) on the 1^st of February, 2020. It is a project under ITC and implemented by RashtriyaGraminVikashNidhi (RGVN). The project area consists of seven gram panchayats under two blocks namely Rampur and Chhaygaon block. The main objective of this project is to identify the major crops in the area and set up Farmer Field Schools (FFS) by selecting potential farmers in order to enhance the income of the farmers atleast by 10-15 %. The potential farmers need to cultivate the crops using recommended package of practices. Stage wise trainings, leaflets, modules etc are also provided to the farmers from time to time. Every FFS has 25 members out of which one farmer is considered as the lead farmer and the rest twenty four are the student farmers who need to replicate the same in their fields. Cultivation of Jaati bamboo and providing the farmers with suitable market is also an important objective of the project. Scaling up sustainable intensification (SUSI) programme under which revolving loans are provided to active SHG’s for developing piggery, fishery, goatery or vegetable garden is also an important activity under this project. Till date ridge gourd and okra seeds, pesticides, fungicides and traps have been supplied to the farmers and many trainings have already been given in the fields. Nearly 500 farmers have certainly availed benefits under the project. The members are also trying their best to link the farmers with the government schemes so that farmers are able to derive benefit out of it.