The Need In India

The Area in India served by Garden Harvest is the Dakshin Dinajpur District of West Bengal. an area of 5887 sq. kilometers that includes Calcutta and the area to that city's north.  Countries that share international boundaries with West Bengal include Bhutan, Bangladesh and Nepal  Click here for a map of the area.

The population is extremely poor, the average per annual per capita income being less than $200.

The Diet of the local population:
The diet consists of one very frugal meal a day, it consists of rice/boiled potato and vegetables particularly during the winter when vegetables are cheaper, occasionally  their meals are supplemented by fish or eggs, which of course is once in a blue moon.

Housing:
Residents live in thatched huts which consist of just one multipurpose room without any kind of provisions for a kitchen nor any electricity nor running water.   

Agriculture:
Most of the families in the area of operation hold a small patch of arable land. Agriculture is rain fed. If water is available they can produce rice paddy, wheat and mustard.

Education:
The economic condition of local residents is so grim that many cannot afford to send their children to school. The majority of their children have to work with their parents to act as helping hands rather than attend school. In a village like Vikahar approximately more than 350 children are unable to go to school due to lack of food and dress. This fact has been further aggravated by the phenomenon of seasonal migration. In the lean months the able bodied persons migrate to other cities or districts in search of jobs.

Therefore, the best option will be to provide these marginalized families, which again constitutes the majority in the area, with cow/goat/domestic poultry. This support will enable them to utilize the animal resources to fetch income as well as to ensure nutrition to the family members. So, animal husbandry will go a long way to supplement the income of the marginalized population in the area. It may also be mentioned that the villagers are more or less adept in animal rearing, but of course they need bit of exposure by way of training so that they can derived optimum output from the animal resources.

To read about one of Garden Harvest's success stories in India, CLICK HERE