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This is the second entry in a collection of field commentaries by FOLU India. 

SAHeLEE, a project initiated by FOLU India, aims to improve the consumption of safe and nutritious food from locally grown grains, seeds, nuts, and fruits in Mukteshwar, a village located in the state of Uttarakhand, India. ‘Sahelee’ means ‘friend’ in the Hindi language and, instinctively, one of our first steps was to connect and form relationships with the local community to better understand their nutrition-based habits and challenges.  

With the project commencing amidst the pandemic lockdowns, FOLU India researchers were faced with the issue of not being able to interact with farmers in person and had to turn to WhatsApp and Microsoft Teams for communication. We set up a series of group chats with them to help us develop an understanding of popular local foods and common culinary practices. Through these online conversations we were glad to observe the community’s willingness to explore options to improve their livelihoods and the nutritional status of their children. 

However, continuously engaging with the community from afar was certainly a challenge! By inviting the local community to partake in various activities we managed to sustain interest and improve communications. For example, an online recipe competition helped us connect with women in the area, who recorded and shared short videos of their favourite local food items. Besides creating a buzz around the project objectives, the videos allowed us to learn about the popular grains and greens in the villages, the wide range of culinary techniques practiced, and the cooking fuels commonly used in homes. 

Next, we intend to use community radio to expand our project to other surrounding areas. The local radio station, ‘Kumaun Vani’ reaches 500 villages in the district of Nainital. We plan to organize and broadcast a series of interactive programmes on nutritional science. These would include quizzes, expert interviews, and jingle competitions in local colleges offering courses in Home Science and Agriculture.

The radio will also broadcast programmes based on the training given to local ‘Self-Help Groups’ on the nutritious food products developed under SAHeLEE. FOLU India aims to set up knowledge centers to increase awareness about healthy diets and sustainable food choices.  

Our efforts of building a relationship with the community are strengthened by earlier projects undertaken by The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), one of FOLU India’s core partners, on sustainable agriculture and expanding livelihood opportunities among farmers in the region. We intend to adopt some of those best practices to achieve intended results. 

Learn more about FOLU India’s efforts towards community mobilization towards the integration of local superfoods to boost nutrition security in our third field update.

Photo credit: Vidhu Gupta

Authors: Meena Sehgal, Fmr Senior Fellow, The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) and Vidhu Gupta, Fmr Associate Fellow, TERI. TERI is a FOLU India core partner

Read the full compilation of field commentaries by FOLU India here.

This is the first entry in a collection of field commentaries by FOLU India. 

Nestled in the Himalayan state of Uttarakhand, the local community of Mukteshwar faces several challenges when it comes to the production and consumption of local food. This is mainly due to limited resources and infrastructure, but the fragile ecosystem surrounding the region adds further pressure. The area is prone to frequent landslides during the rainy season, and villages remain snowbound in winter.

With the intention of supporting the region to create a more sustainable food system, FOLU India has launched the initiative ‘Striving for Advancement in Health and Improved Quality of Life through Entrepreneurship and Education’, also known as Project SAHeLEE.  Through SAHeLEE, the aim is to improve the consumption of safe and nutritious food from locally grown grains, seeds, nuts, and fruits. The project is based on three interlinked strategic objectives:

1. Increase the availability of nutritious foods
2. Improve consumption of nutritious food
3. Introduce clean cooking techniques

As we establish networks of regional partners in Mukteshwar, we intend to create local solutions to malnutrition by improving access to food that is sustainably grown, produced, and processed, such as through school feeding programmes and other state-level initiatives.
Generally, the processing of food leads to pollution and Greenhouse Gas emissions, both upstream and downstream of food supply chains. Hence, our mantra for achieving a sustainable food system in the region will be to minimize this negative impact on the environment, especially with respect to carbon and water, by promoting the adoption of clean cooking fuel, deploying solar energy, water recycling, and converting food waste into animal and poultry feed. We are hoping that these sustainable interventions will inspire others along the supply chain, such as large food corporations, to support the upscaling.

Towards this end, we are building alliances among state government departments, local farmers, and women-led micro-enterprises to improve access to micro-credits, enhance the availability of micronutrient–rich products and their market demand. Engagement at multiple levels of governance will further guide, shape and influence policymaking and advance nutrition-based resilience in the local community of Mukteshwar.

Our first step is to create demonstration projects, providing the community members with an opportunity to learn in real-time. This will allow stakeholders to identify impacts, approaches and solutions that can be scaled up or improved. An important expected outcome of this initiative would be to create resilient farming communities in Mukteshwar engaged in the local food supply chain by providing technical support and upskilling them on various aspects of sustainable food production and consumption.

Learn more about FOLU India’s efforts to create awareness and engage participation from the different stakeholders within the community in our second field update.

Authors: Meena Sehgal, Fmr Senior Fellow, The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) and Vidhu Gupta, Fmr Associate Fellow, TERI. TERI is a FOLU India core partner

Read the full compilation of field commentaries by FOLU India here.