Monday, May 5, 2003		Feature

Lata (25) used to be just another housewife in a small village in Hoshangabad district, Madhya Pradesh. She wanted to work to supplement her family income, but she was illiterate, inexperienced and her husband didn’t want her to go out among strangers, especially men.

Today, Lata earns Rs 1,000 a month. She works three to four hours every day processing sauces, jams, juices and pickles using modern machines installed at the village centre. Her husband is happy too as her income promises them a secure future.

Like Lata, women and men from more than 3,00,000 families in 2,500 villages of Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh (central India) and Jharkhand (eastern India) have benefited from the Science and Technology Applied for Rural Transformation (START) project. Initiated by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the project uses simple but appropriate technology for social development.

START operates through a network of technology development and resource centres. For example, in Madhya Pradesh, the Regional Research Laboratory (RRL) in Bhopal acts as the technology centre, while local block-level NGOs offer space for resource centres. Each technology centre develops a network of smaller NGOs and women-dominated self-help groups (SHGs) to implement the project. The project is executed under the guidance
of the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India.
"We strongly believe that social development is possible only when people’s stomachs are full," says Dr M V R L Murthy from RRL. "This project fulfils the twin objectives of productively using the natural resources of the region and using technology as an enabling tool to enhance opportunities." Initially, a comprehensive mapping of village resources and infrastructure is undertaken. Local NGOs train villagers to conduct surveys indicating agricultural production of the area, farm size, number of households, cattle and wells in the region. This information is then fed into Geographical Information System (GIS) software at the Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai, to prepare village resource maps. "We spent around Rs 500 for mapping each village. These low-cost precision maps are not only useful for the implementation of our own projects, they are also in great demand for planning and execution of welfare schemes by government departments," says Dr Murthy.
Based on this information, the local technology centre is equipped with training inputs to put village resources to best use, thereby creating sustainable employment opportunities for the local population. Take the centre in Kesla block, Hoshangabad, where Lata works. The area has a rich produce of tomatoes, oranges, chillies, carrots and other seasonal fruits and vegetables. While the ‘A’ and ‘B’ grade produce is picked up by the market, farmers are left with a huge lower quality stock that would be left to rot. Now, this produce is bought by the technology development centres at competitive rates.

Lata and other women are trained to work on food processing machines and churn out ready-to-market juices, pickles, sauces and jams. The food processing machines include pulpers, double-jacketed steam kettles (for cooking), pulverisers, dryers and corking machines.

Each product is then put through rigorous quality checks. The Kesla centre hopes to get a license to market products in urban centres.
Other technology resource centres have also taken up activities like growing medicinal and aromatic plants, planting low-cost nurseries, mushroom cultivation and poultry farming. Two major activities being pursued at most centres are detergent-making and producing vermin-compost.

A heartening trend has been the use of technology centres as counselling and
aid forums. Members frequently discuss and solve mutual problems as they go
about their work at the centres. Small banks have also started functioning in some
centres. — WFS