Climate Change Volunteer Lead the Way
Parmanand Singh is a climate change volunteer of Jamuniyatand a village in Giridih. He has registered himself on the Indian Meteorological Department website for weather forecast and crop advisories. He then disseminates in the village for the benefit of the farmers. This week’s advisory on rain predication, temperature, cloud cover for one week is very helpful to the farmers for their Rabi crops. They can avoid irrigation to their Gram and Mustard crops as there is sufficient moisture in the field. They need to care for pest attack on gram, weed the mustard field and protect potato and onion from the cold.
This small initiative by Parmanand brings enormous benefits to all the 40 marginal farming households in Jamuniyatand who earlier would be hugely affected by the slightest climatic variations and weren’t able to offset the losses to their small plots. “We are getting weekly updates from the weather department which helps in advance planning for crop protection. Drought is a big challenge in our village. The information on rainfall pattern and availability will be very useful to us. Earlier we didn’t have such information and had to suffer huge losses because of crop failure. I as a Climate Change Volunteer feel very happy to share such information to the other farmers in my village”, recounted Parmanand.
IGSSS along with Abhivyakti Foundation is implementing ‘Creating Livelihood Adaption under Drought (CLAD)’ project in Bengabad Block of Giridih District in Jharkhand.