Poultry Farmer
(RACHANA)
Rachana was one of the first women to enrol on Poultry Development Services when we launched the programme in Nayagarth District, Odisha in April 2022. She is from a community of Scheduled Tribal people and, as such, is identified as one of the poorest of the poor. The family does not own any land for agriculture and their only source of income was by working as daily wage labourers for a local farmer. That was until we met Rachana and introduced her to backyard poultry farming.
As the programme was so new in her area, we organised a visit for Rachana and nine other women to our Sundia location in West Bengal (the neighbouring state to Odisha) so they could meet women already on the programme and see the impact it was making at first hand. When the group returned to their village two days later they were ready to start the training programme with our field team, build their chicken coop and receive their own poultry toolkits – the chicks, feed and vaccines we provide to get them started with their poultry enterprise. That was in June and by September, Rachana’s chickens were ready for selling at the local market. Rachana was delighted to tell us that she earned Rs 4,930 (about £52) in just three months and had also managed to keep some of her chickens to feed the family. She is now a role model and inspiration for many other landless and vulnerable women in her locality.
