ENTERPRISE & LIVELIHOODS

Pragya works with some of India’s poorest communities living in challenging environments on the margins of society. Rural, agrarian communities are often beset by chronic insecurity and the severe anxiety that comes with subsistence agriculture in volatile climates where climate change is spurring ever-more unpredictable threats to lives and livelihoods. They face multiple layers of socioeconomic disadvantage, with low educational attainment and lack of skills coupled with a scarcity of job opportunities resulting in job insecurity and high unemployment. Meagre land holdings are subject to further division by generation, with some labourers entirely landless, and what land is available is often characterised by poor quality soils on challenging terrain with inadequate irrigation – leaving farmers unable to produce enough to feed their families. The poor nutritional health that follows may impact farmers’ ability to work, compounding the problems. Even where smallholding communities are able to generate sufficient agricultural produce, they commonly lack access to the marketplace and have little capacity to generate market linkages. Often being from minority ethnic backgrounds,

India’s poorest rural communities also face entrenched economic discrimination from mainstream populations. Lack of job opportunities in neglected, particularly rural communities in India is causing socioeconomic stagnation and encouraging youth outmigration in search of better prospects; there has been a particularly drastic decline in the numbers of women in rural employment. The apparent lack of rural job creation persists despite India’s growing economy, with ruinous impacts on local economies and detrimental to the continuity of cultural identities. Our Livelihoods and Enterprise Development programme is helping lift deprived communities out of poverty, providing vital inputs and training across both traditional and niche-sector occupations.

UPDATES

>> Pragya is skilling youth through the vocational courses training and promoting local enterprise along with facilitating access to employment in India. >> Growing Medicinal and aromatic plants, is becoming a lucrative economic opportunity for poor communities struggling to earn a living, in India and Kenya. >> Livelihood alternatives are being provided to beneficiaries in disaster-affected areas of Nepal. >> Our team recently organized the livestock distribution for the char community in Lohaujong to attain sustainable livelihood. >> The Resource Centres and Mobile Vikas Kendras in collaboration with @Alstom are providing education and vocational skillbuilding in Madhepura.