Tezpur district Mahila Samiti, in collaboration with Eco Roots Foundation, New Delhi, organized a three-day training programme for women to produce handmade marketable products branded as “Jal Sparsh.”
Jal Sparsh:
It is a livelihood project focused on transforming waste into wealth, where rural women (including 20% indigenous women) are trained to extract water hyacinths from local ponds.
The women are taught to cut, clean, and dry the stems and then produce handmade marketable products from them, branded as “Jal Sparsh.”
Project Objectives
To provide livelihood opportunities to 2000 marginalized rural women after their training and capacity building for extraction of water hyacinth and making products from it.
Reviving water bodies/ ponds in villages across India by removal of water hyacinth and using the extracted stems in making useful and marketable products out of it.
Creating sustainable market linkages for the women beneficiaries to keep working in the field on the project and be able to get income of it.
Creation of Composting pits in all the 100 villages so that the leaves and roots of the extracted plant can also be put to some use
Implementation and Expansion:
The Eco Roots Foundation initially implemented this pilot project in seven villages of Noida with the support of SIDBI.
The project is now being expanded to reach 2,000 women in 100 villages across five states: Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, and Assam.
Assam and Bihar will provide 400 indigenous beneficiaries out of the total 2,000 participants.
Programme in Assam:
In Sonitpur district, the first training session of the initial module took place between April 27 and May 2, and the second phase of the training concluded recently.
The programme was financially supported by the Small Industries Development Bank of India(SIDBI).
The training aimed to empower 200 women from 10 villages in Sonitpur district, particularly tribal women, by teaching them to produce marketable products from water hyacinth to become economically self-reliant.
The project is being implemented across five states, with production training already underway.
Community Involvement: Tezpur Mahila Samiti noted that women beneficiaries, particularly from the Bodo community, have been actively participating in the training sessions.
The project was immensely successful in the pilot phase where it was implemented in the 7 villages of District Gautambuddha Nagar supporting 140 direct rural marginalized women beneficiaries.
The project has been able to provide for a regular monthly income of as high as INR 5500 per month to some extent while the women beneficiaries in the other villages are also getting a minimum income of Rs. 3000 per month. Considering the success of the pilot, the project support for the scale up was also extended by Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI).
