Odisha Millet Mission going great guns with women Milletpreneurs  

Building the Millet narrative in the state through the OMM

Dibyajyoti SHG, a self-help group run by 80 women in the tribal district of Sundergarh in western Odisha, recently clocked a revenue of Rs 1.5 crore and its products have even made it to international food fairs. While the Government of Odisha is its biggest client, Dibyajyoti also supplies its products to corporates and private educational institutions. Women members of this self-help group take home nothing less than Rs 10,000 a month and have been able to bring their families out of poverty.

Ganga Singh, founder of the 10-member Krishna SHG, says that ragi chicken momo is her bestseller. Singh has replaced the maida or rice-flour exterior of momos with ragi. Her ragi custard, foxtail fried rice and ragi chicken manchurian are popular too. Her Rs 25 lakh venture caters to the Millet Café set up on the premises of the collectorate and takes up several party orders. “I even supply millet snacks to Government offices in Bhubaneswar,” says Singh.

The Odisha Millet Mission (OMM) has 1,500 such women-led self-help groups through which it is building the millet narrative in the state. It’s well-known that India is at the forefront of millets promotion globally and the state governments have instituted millet missions. “Odisha already had a programme called Mission Shakti which empowers women with financial independence. Throughout the value chain, we have involved women self-help groups because if you involve the community from the beginning they feel they have a stake in the game,” explains Arabinda Padhee, principal secretary (department of agriculture and farmers’ empowerment), Government of Odisha.

So, if 10 farmers in a village own 2-3 acre of land, they are encouraged to give a small portion of their land to their wives to grow ragi or mandiya (the most popular millet in the state). The government not just procures from these women farmers at MSP (Rs 3,500- Rs 3,578 per quintal), it also incentivises them with an additional Rs 10,000 per hectare for the first five years. A major part of the millet mission’s goal is to increase consumer awareness and Padhee feels that since women are caregivers the women-led SHGs would help in popularising millet consumption.

Building the Millet narrative in the state