The Ambuja Foundation supported Shivam Milk Producers Co-operative Society in Nalagarh was felicitated by the Honourable Chief Minister Ram Thakur for the best work done by a Farmer Producer Organization in the areas of aggregation and marketing during the Himachal Pradesh State Credit Seminar organized by NABARD.

In an absorbing conversation with Thrive, Ravi Nayse, GM – Skill Development at Ambuja Foundation outlines the work A mbuja Foundation has been doing to enable rural youth to have a prosperous future.

Mobilisation of rural youth for skill training programmes has always been a challenge. Traditional mindsets, youth aspirations, and an unwillingness to migrate to other towns/cities often stand in the way of youth enrolment.

By building people's institutions, Ambuja Foundation generates a multiplier effect- empowering men and women to run their own Federations or Farmer Producer Organisations and kickstarting a movement in the process.

Ambuja Foundation's rigorous programme monitoring process is helping get 'more bang for buck' per project, by harnessing qualitative and quantitative data to monitor each project and identify ways in which we can improve our work and generate multiple impacts.

Most countries have a singular objective when it comes to economic growth - to improve the lives of its citizens. But, regrettably, India's strong economic growth in the past has consistently excluded the rural poor, which constitutes approximately 71% of our population.

The pandemic has exposed just how vulnerable India's labour force is. An estimated 450 million internal migrant workers make up 92 percent of the labour force in India - with the majority of them hailing from rural India.

In order to tackle malnutrition which is an endemic in a larger number of districts in India, the month of September is celebrated as 'Rashtriya Poshan Maah' - a campaign of the Government of India to highlight nutrition as a key component of the National Development Agenda and achieve better nutritional outcomes.

The 2019/20 Annual Report was launched in September, highlighting the achievements of the Foundation over the last 12months, and once again an e-version of the report was distributed online to all key stakeholders.

Did you know that 72.4% of India's workforce lives in rural areas? And that agriculture supports nearly 70% of this rural workforce? But with small land holdings and an over dependence on the monsoon, these livelihoods are often unsustainable. Couple that with outdated farming methods, lack of irrigation, and difficulty in accessing markets, and agriculture-dependent households quickly spiral down into a kind of poverty which is hard to break out of.

Chandrakant Kumbhani - GM-Community Development at Ambuja Foundation is a seasoned professional in Rural Development with more than 20 years of experience under his belt.

Anagha Mahajani - GM, Program Research & Monitoring at Ambuja Foundation has over 25 years' experience in the development sector and is a qualified management and research practitioner with publications to her credit.