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Social
Impacts
Natural
Resource conservation
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With
rapidly depleting groundwater resources and erratic
rainfall pattern, water is rapidly becoming a
scarce natural resource. Hence the need for water
conservation is a critical environmental imperative.
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Micro
irrigation is the most efficient way of providing water
to plants as it specifically delivers water to the roots
of the plants. The use of technology enables water saving
of 50-70%, increase in yield of 50%, 30% savings on
fertilizers, reduced weed growth and prevents soil erosion
as the rate of application of water is very slow.
In India,70% farmers are cultivators of small plots
from which they can hardly get food security let alone
sustainable incomes. Most of them are small and marginal
farmers cultivating land less than 1 hectare in size,
average size of which decreases by half every 15 years
due to the rapid population growth. Today nearly 60%
of the farmers belong to marginal category with an average
of 0.4 ha land.
The decreasing land sizes call for better land use and
cropping intensity. The drip technology helps marginal
farmers to make the best use of their limited water
resources through prudent use of water and increase
their area under irrigation converting their unused
land into agricultural productive land thus reducing
the stress on two precious natural resources- land and
water.
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Gender
Issues
A number of assessment and socio-economic impact
studies carried out in different regions of program
implementation in India, have captured the changing
roles of women and altered gender relations.
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It
has documented how the technology brings changes in
roles of men and women due to crossing over of age old
customs and deep rooted mindsets. Operating the technology,
they have flexible arrangements in their work divisions
and have thus become multi skilled, resulting in their
enhanced mental horizon and enriched lives.
More women have come out of their homes to operate the
productivity enhancing technology and have taken pride
in increasing their house hold food security through
new skills exposure and opportunities. With Drip irrigation,
there is greater participation of women in agricultural
activities, thus allowing greater control of the women
on the activity and the income there from. The nutrition
effect of the drip kits was also found to be very positive.
With availability of vegetables and fruits for sale,
some of it is also consumed by the growing family, which
was not available to them earlier. Documented studies
have shown inclusion of vegetables and fruits in the
diets of the family using the technologies.
The strongest effect of extra income is withdrawal of
the women of the household from wage labour market and
save them from the drudgery of working away from home
as contracted labourers and the humiliation that they
are prone to, at the hands of the employer. Bucket kit
and Drum kits provide opportunity to the women for an
extra income at the very homestead of a family. They
can work without any fear of harassment and do not have
to leave their children at the care of the siblings.
The tribal women have shifted their roles from being
wage laborers to independent farmers with keen and vigorous
farming interests in good agronomic practices and market
prices.
Similarly, Treadle pump can easily be operated by women
and has brought an improvement in the situation of women
by increasing household food security and nutritional
variety. Since Treadle Pumps are largely being used
for vegetable cultivation, women have enlarged their
roles and competencies, moving from farm activities
to buying and selling of vegetables in the market.
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