Transition to Bio-diverse Ecological Farming in Maharashtra

Society for Promoting Participative Ecosystem Management (SOPPECOM), Pune, Maharashtra

Contact: Ms. Seema Kulkarni

Dates: March 2021 – September 2025

Total Budget: Rs. 15,00,000

2025 Budget: None, funding completed

This project, funded by multiple donors, has introduced women to agro-ecological farming techniques in five districts of Maharashtra. In 2025, there are 236 women farmers in the program. PPI’s grant supported 59 women farmers in Yavatmal, the district most affected by farmer suicides. Six new women farmers were added to the Yavatmal program this year. 

After four years of steady engagement, the program has entered a new phase and the  women farmers are now confidently practicing self-reliant, agroecology-based farming across drought-prone districts of Maharashtra. These women are actively demonstrating sustainable practices like mixed cropping, soil health improvement, and seed saving as examples for others in their communities to adopt. 

A new initiative of the program has been to introduce wild/uncultivated vegetables that have disappeared from local diets, such as wild amaranth and sorrel. Women farmers from Varud village in Yavatmal organized a wild vegetables festival (Ranbhaji Mahotsav). They invited students and teachers from the local Zilla Parishad Primary School and introduced them to local biodiversity, traditional food systems, and the value of wild and farm-grown vegetables. 

For training, SOPPECOM has introduced new participatory tools that were very successful. These tools include games such as “Identify the Wild Uncultivated Vegetables” and “Sequence the Farming Tasks”. 

As before, farmers benefited from field visits to the main training farm and exchange visits to each other’s farms. 

The champion/leader farmers understand agroecology principles and train other farmers in the community. For example, at a workshop, a champion woman farmer from Yavatmal described her sowing pattern in detail — explaining how cowpea helps control pests in moong, how pigeon pea acts as a bird halt, and how nitrogen-fixing crops like moong and urad enrich the soil naturally. 

The agroecology based self-reliant farming program has helped transform the lives of women farmers. In addition to food and nutrition security, there has been a visible change in women farmers’ confidence and sense of collectivization. 

2022 Progress Report  2023 Progress Report   2024 Final Report  2025 Final Report