The Revitalising Rainfed Agriculture Network along with some collaborating organizations had organized the National Convention on Rainfed Agriculture. The second day at the convention was informative as a discussion on themes like “Policy and Institutional Intervention for supplying Forest rights holder in rainfed areas" was discussed with Panel of speakers like ,Geetanjali Sahu, TISS Mumbai; Sanghamitra Dubey, Independent Researcher; Balram Ji, Advisor to Govt. of Jharkhand etc. Session on experience sharing - Central India, Eastern India and strategies for supporting Forest Rights Holder for their livelihood security was a part of the conference.
Another theme of the Conference was "Water as a driver of Revitalizing rainfed agriculture in India." where prioritizing the rainfed districts: Mechanism and approach were discussed with emphasis on Protective irrigation in dryland agriculture-AP, 'Spring-sheds' in Himachal Pradesh, Groundwater and rain-fed agriculture: experiences in participatory groundwater management were all the agenda during the conference.
Many academicians and scientist from different part of country participated and made the event informative. The participants for the other day included Dr. B. Venkateshwarlu, Board Member, RRA Network; Shri Ravindra A, Director, WASSAN; Shri Siddharth Tripathi, IFS and many others.
No doubt, the conference provided the wonderful platform for presenting detail ideas for restructuring Policy and Public Investments to address Agrarian Crisis and the contribution of different organizations all over the country regarding the same.
RRA Network, formed in 2010 is a pan India network of more than 600 members, including eminent academics, policymakers, farmer and civil society organizations that work to influence public systems, policy and investments for productive, prosperous and resilient rainfed agriculture.
RRA Network was and has since been evolving operational processes for planning and convergence to facilitate the revival of rainfed agriculture.
During the 1st phase between 2011- 2015, the member NGOs collected evidences and experiences through comprehensive thematic pilots on various aspects of rainfed agriculture such as soil, seeds, millets, fisheries, livestock, credit, markets and institutions. These provided the basis for a new roadmap.
In the 2nd phase, the network is mandated to take up only those processes that have a clear pathway to policy change – potential to make a significant impact on nature, amount or delivery of public investments in favour of rainfed areas.
The Network Functions with the:
VISION: To facilitate the establishment of productive and resilient rainfed agriculture systems.
MISSION: To affect the nature, amount and delivery of public investments for the establishment of productive and resilient rainfed agriculture.
