The main aim of the project is ?Conservation of threatened medicinal plants through in-situ practices, micro enterprise development for health & livelihood security in three Districts of Chhattisgarh?. The project area will cover 60 villages in three districts of Bilaspur; Korba and Mungeli Districts of Chhattisgarh. 4800 HHs (House Holds) will be benefited from the core villages and 10,000 HHs will be benefited at large. Medicinal nursery garden will be developed in 80 acres of land including the 50 acres land allocated by SMPB (State Medicinal Plant Board) for herbal farming in Bilaspur. Objectives of the project:
? The project envisage to promote planting of threatened medicinal plants species in the community forest land & kitchen gardens (60 target villages) and to promote micro-enterprise establish outlets and institutionalizing them.
? Develop training modules and conduct training for good collection practices of threatened medicinal plants species in the community co-managed forests, the project in its life cycle would train 100 youth from villages to grow and use these species for curing common ailments.
? Linking and developing micro enterprises to Govt. schemes and sharing the initiative as ?Green Health? and its health benefits with media & policymakers for integrating & up-scaling this initiative.
Project Activities:
? Identifying forest & community gardens for planting of the 12 identified threatened medicinal plants for conservation in 4 districts.
? Develop audio-visual training module & train 100 village youth to grow & use these species for curing common ailments. Their short term skill course certification through Bilaspur University will be attempted.
? Planting of over 1 million seeds/ saplings in forests/ village fallow land/ orchards/ farm bunds etc. by collecting seeds from the forest, & motivate JFM (Joint Forest Management)/ village forest committees to plant & conserve these.
? Produce & market over 1 million worth medicines through 1,000 existing members of THA (The Implementing Organisation) at Rs.1,000/- each on an average sharing of 50% profit for further training of the gatherers, farmers & enhancing the natural resource base by planting etc.
? Raising 100,000 (one hundred thousand) saplings of these species in the family/ village gardens through 100 women SHGs in 60 villages & train them in growing & using these herbs for the primary healthcare.
? Communicating the compared health status with un-reached families with media & society through meetings, workshops, seminars, visits and various media and for its up-scaling & adoption in government health schemes such as AYUSH department.
? Construct 600 smokeless chulhas (Cook Stoves) in the tribal houses.
? Take enterprise and value addition for Mahua, Honey and others including mango etc., and link into the principles of Gram Udyog (Cottage Industries).
The Organisation has already promoted medicinal plants farming to improve livelihood with about 100 healers, the farmers earn about Rs. 9,000/-($ 150) each on an average i.e. their 20% income from it. The forest department has started 30 forest clinics of which 13 are running by THA members to secure health of about 1,000 (one thousand) poor families. The organization has an active association of traditional healers with a network of around 1000 traditional healers throughout the State. Moreover 100 youth will be trained as young traditional healers under the project and existing traditional healer?s capacity will be developed with better networking and market linkages.
The project has established link with the State Medicinal Plant Board, Chhattisgarh and have got their support and would also be receiving co-financing from the Board. One of the ideology that the Organisation is maintaining, it does not sell any rare threatened species implying no resource risk, ensuring ecological, economic & institutional sustainability. After 3 years, at the end of the project, the expected outcome of the project will be as follows:
1. About 1 million saplings of threatened species growing in the central/ north regions of the state that could reduce their future scarcity & avoid the extinction risk
2. A micro-enterprise owned by the traditional healer community to produce & dispense herbal medicines for rural health security
3. Trained 100 village youth in growing & sustainably using these species for the healthcare, value addition & marketing of herbal medicines for rural healthcare security, who can be certified as village botanists for similar work in future
4. Health security/ improvement of Over 10,000 families that would buy & use the herbal medicines produced.
5. Families health improved, disease burden reduced & medical cost saved by over 50%, which could improve their productivity
6. Linkage of THA to various Government schemes & the industry for wide cultivation of these & other herbs & integrate medicinal plants in the development agenda of the state.