Current projects

Jeevika Trust’s approach to village livelihood is to integrate head, heart and hands. None of them alone goes far enough. Both we and our partners are motivated by a compassionate understanding of the needs of deprived groups in village India, directed by research, analysis and careful planning, and fulfilled through focused hands-on action among marginalised village communities.

Over the past 2-3 years Jeevika Trust has expanded its operating partnerships to work not only with Schumacher Centre for Development (SCD), our sister organisation in Delhi, but with a number of small and medium-sized grassroots organisations based in Tamil Nadu and Orissa. To find out more about these new partners, click here.

Our commitment for the future is driven by evidence of the changes we have been able to achieve, the livelihoods we have been able to contribute to, the women we have helped to find self-respect and rewards, and the communities who have worked together and developed a new sense of self-determination and hope.

Working with these India-based partner organisations, we are currently undertaking more than 10 projects in the States of Tamil Nadu and Orissa which are benefiting over 15,000 villagers in more than 25 villages, as well as extending our support in two areas where SCD has operated over recent years – in the northern state of Uttarakhand and in south west Uttar Pradesh. These include:

Project Shakti-2, Uttarakhand (Schumacher Centre for Development)
This project is designed to strengthen the establishment of bee-keeping livelihoods among 12 villages where, despite considerable obstacles, groups of marginalised women have persisted in developing honey-production as a contribution to family income. Along with the continuation of garment-making and awareness-raising on health and hygiene as well as gender and human rights, Self Help Groups will move to concentrate their hives into certain areas for better joint management and marketing.

Project Goharra Pond, Uttar Pradesh (Schumacher Centre for Development)
Goharra, to the west of Agra, is one of a cluster of villages where a pilot goat-rearing project has already provided SCD with the opportunity to identify and address other priorities. These include, in particular, access to safe water, and this project involves the drainage and deepening of a long-stagnant village pond, diversion of house drains and other measures to establish access to year-round safe water for 120 households, while promoting better family understanding/adoption of health and hygiene practices.

Project Madhu-2, Orissa (Jeevan Rekha Parishad)
Project Madhu is a 2-year beekeeping initiative for 100 tribal women who live in the Chandaka Tribal Forest Area of Orissa. In 2009, the project’s first year after completing a successful pilot year, we are expanding this project to reach a further 42 women and their families. By providing Self-Help Group development, livelihood training and equipment for honey production as well as for medicinal herb and kitchen garden production, women beekeepers are providing honey for their families, selling surplus honey at the village market and contributing to household income. These bee colonies also make a vital contribution to pollination of fruits and crops and help sustain the local ecology.

Project Pani, Orissa (Jeevan Rekha Parishad)
Project Pani is a pilot project which provides the main village school with a rooftop rainwater harvesting system, clean drinking water and sanitation facilities for 250 students and their teachers in Daruthenga village in Orissa. This will produce a marked reduction in the number of girls who stay away from school due to absence of sanitation. The students participate in Eco Clubs to help them better understand how to manage their environment and enjoy developing kitchen gardens and fruit trees, which add to school and household nutrition.

Project Mousmi, Orissa (Jeevan Rekha Parishad)
Project Mousmi is an extensive three-year project which addresses the need for safe clean water for household use and sanitation to improve health, small-scale cultivation and environmental sustainability. This project covers a broad range of activities from rainwater harvesting and containment of water sources, to teacher/student Eco clubs, a village awareness campaign and development of small-scale water-based cultivation and livelihoods. It will benefit over 3,000 people in five villages located in the Chandaka Tribal Forest Area of Orissa.

Project Eco, Orissa (Jeevan Rekha Parishad)
Project Eco is a pilot initiative working to conserve the ecology of a lagoon island, Mahinsa, and its lagoon-linked mangrove eco-system located in the Chilika Lagoon of Orissa. The island’s 150 households will work to strengthen the island’s capacity to provide shelter from cyclones by planting mangroves and coconut palms, and to develop its own source of food, energy for electricity and cooking, and water for drinking and sanitation. At the same time, lagoon-linked livelihoods such as crab cultivation, fruit trees and organic farming will enable women and farmers to improve the quality and sustainability of island life.

Project Annai Mary-2, Tamil Nadu (Annai Mary Foundation)
Project Annai Mary is a livelihood project for 150 Tribal and Dalit women beekeepers in 3 villages in south Tamil Nadu, and includes a small number of women who have registered as HIV+. After completing a successful pilot year, we are expanding this project to an additional 50 women and their families. The women use the honey for household consumption, medicinal purposes and generating an income from surplus honey sold in local markets. Project activities also include organic composting and kitchen garden production, the vegetables of which improve family nutrition and generate a little income when there is surplus.

Project Mithra-2, Tamil Nadu (Mithra Foundation)
Project Mithra works with village families with HIV/AIDS, building their capacity to generate income from candle-making and goat-rearing and provides a crèche facility for their children while they work. Following on the successful pilot project completed in 2008, Jeevika Trust is continuing to support Mithra Foundation to strengthen its activities. In its second year, the project has expanded its HIV/AIDS beneficiaries from 127 to over 190, it is continuing to provide income-generation training and market outlets for candles and ten local volunteers are now supporting the project’s HIV/AIDS awareness-raising role in the wider community.

Project Pisces, Tamil Nadu (SCAD)
Project Pisces builds on Project Ooranie which established three ooranies or water catchment systems in three villages in south Tamil Nadu. Project Ooranie linked the ooranies to a water management strategy which now provides clean water for households and water for agricultural purposes, benefiting women and children in particular who previously had to walk long distances to collect safe water daily. Project Pisces includes establishment of a new fish hatchery which will supply the same three ooranies with ‘fingerlings’ of selected varieties of fish to be grown during the 6-8 months following the monsoon and harvested annually in mid-late summer. The income from fish sales will be deposited in Village Funds to cover ongoing annual costs and to be used by villagers to deposit savings and make loans in support of village livelihoods.

Project Namakkal, Tamil Nadu (WORD)
Project Namakkal is a pilot project to empower over 550 Dalit women, including widows, in five villages in south-west Tamil Nadu by providing livelihood training so that they can generate income. A Revolving Fund will also be established to enable women to deposit savings and make loans so that they can invest in their activities, contribute to household income and improve the quality of family life. Other activities include raising the awareness of human rights issues among these women and villagers generally in an area which has a high-level of domestic violence.

Stakeholder Workshops, India-wide
Jeevika Trust has initiated Stakeholder Workshops to bring together Jeevika Trust’s local partner organisations so that they can network, share resource information and strengthen their capacity for project design and delivery.