Growing onions, mushrooms, and corn doubles the income of 25000 farmers
In 2015, Prabhat returned to his hometown in Gaya district and launched SumArth, a non-profit organization that has impacted the lives of 25,000 farmers in 500 villages across six districts including Gaya, Jehanabad, Arwal, Aurangabad, Nawada, and Nalanda in Bihar.
After toiling day and night for months, farmers were hardly earning Rs 10,000 from an acre in a year,” he shares. “The biggest problem that I observed in traditional farming is that farmers have to bear recurring expenses for six months on fertilizers and pesticides, but will get a one-time return if climate conditions are favorable,” he adds.
Farmers opted for onion cultivation as it is a nonperishable crop and its price increases by four times if you have good storage facilities. Farmers opted for onion cultivation as it is a nonperishable crop and its price increases by four times if you have good storage facilities.
Owing to the unprofitable farming, Prabhat says his cousins and friends back home would ask him to get them menial jobs in cities. “Despite the long working hours and discomforts of cities, they wanted to move outside Bihar for Rs 5,000- 10,000 monthly jobs as security guards but did not prefer to stay in the village to farm,” he adds.
“After coming back, I convinced farmers to try horticulture crops and made a deal with them to get them jobs in the cities if we don’t succeed,” he says. “A single farmer there was earning Rs 15 lakh from an acre of land by growing horticulture crops like pomegranate, grapes, and onions.
“That day, those farmers learned how limited they were in terms of trying new crops and adopting farming techniques,” adds Prabhat. “They opted for onion cultivation as it is a nonperishable crop and its price increases by four times if you have good storage facilities.
Prabhat is associated with 25,000 farmers who earn double by growing crops like onions, mushrooms, baby corn, and sweet corn. Prabhat is associated with 25,000 farmers who earn double by growing crops like onions, mushrooms, baby corn, and sweet corn.
Farmers doubled their income after 4-5 months by investing Rs 4 per kg and getting Rs 10 per kg from onions. “Each farmer earned Rs 1 lakh income per acre of land,” he shares. With the low-cost storage facility, farmers stored onions for six months from May to October in 2016.
Seeing the success of onion farming, 200 farmers joined Prabhat next year in 2017 to grow mushrooms. He informs that currently, 2,000 farmers are producing around 600 kg of mushrooms per day whereas 5,000 are reaping benefits by growing onions. Prabhat says in mushroom farming, there is a one-time expense to procure the bags and get recurring income daily. Prabhat says in mushroom farming, there is a one-time expense to procure the bags and get recurring income daily.
After mushrooms, Prabhat trained farmers to grow seed corn, baby corn, and strawberries, giving immediate results and better income. Talking about his role, Prabhat says, “We provide an end-to-end solution to these farmers by helping them procure inputs, training them to learn new crops, and awareness on seed treatment to prevent future fungal attacks and boost production.
Starting with 10 farmers, Prabhat is associated with 25,000 farmers in 500 villages who earn double by growing crops like onions, mushrooms, baby corn, and sweet corn. On average, he says the initiative has helped farmers double their income.
We want to increase farmer income to five times so that we do not lag behind progressive states like Maharashtra. In the coming years, I am planning to achieve this by helping farmers process their produce into value-added products,” he adds.
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