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The primary aim of the project is to help Village for Independent and Enterprising Women, and 7 other villages in the area in the South 24 Parganas in West Bengal learn organic farming to become food secure. It is a way to have more yield from the soil without the need for expensive commercial fertilizers and pesticides which increase cost of production and yield little profit after domestic consumption. These chemicals are detrimental to good health of humans and the animals in the farm.
Rotary Club of Kolkata Pointers has identified an NGO in the area that train and help mentally ill homeless women get back on their feet. They are located in Jibantala, in rural South 24-Parganas district of West Bengal, about 28 miles from Kolkata. They have been trying to build a self-sufficient, eco-village on a 4 acre land - with housing for 25 residents, quarters for resident staff, rooms for visiting medical staff and community clinics, a kitchen, as well as huts for farming needs. The land is being prepared for integrated farming, crops and livestock to provide food for the entire unit.
About 1 acre of this land is being used for living quarters and water bodies. The rest of the land can be farmed but the soil does not produce much yield and the monsoon rains flood the area killing a lot of the produce. The farmers in the area face a similar problem and have resorted to leaving the village to find jobs in the cities, some have leased their land for nominal amounts, which then gets used for shallow fisheries. These fisheries further deplete the soil of its nutrients and more chemically unhealthy food (by products of the leather tanning industry) are fed to the fish in these fisheries creating a vicious cycle of lesser and lesser possibility of good crops in the future. Farmers in the area have become very poor, have sold their livestock as there are no grassy areas for them to feed on.
in the project about 120 farmers in the area along with residents of the local NGO in the area called A-View will be trained to learn and participate in organic farming and composting, caring of livestock, growing and harvesting rice, vegetables and fruits.
A DMSB rotary member is a part of the board of the NGO A VIEW, which is not receiving monetary funding, only training and related services.
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