JHARSUGDA: Jeevika Samriddhi, a livelihood project jointly headed by Vedanta Limited and NABARD to promote sustainable livelihoods of farming households through intervention in agriculture and allied activities was formally launched at Siriapali village on 14th July 2017 in Jharsuguda by chief guest Bibhuti Bhushan Pattnaik, IAS Collector & District Magistrate, in the presence of Shakti Prasanna Mohapatra, DDM NABARD, Ambar Lugun, ADH Jharsuguda, Chandra Shekhar Sahoo, Head External Relations Vedanta Ltd., Nishant Kumar, Head CSR Vedanta Ltd., Manoj Barik, Sr. Scientist at Krishi Vigyan Kendra, and Sushil Kumar Das, Secretary SEWA, the implementing agency for this project.
The relevance of Jeevika Samriddhi project is based on the need to augment irrigation infrastructure, promote advanced agriculture, application of bio-fertilizer and pesticides, and make farming as a remunerative profession.
The project will adopt two pronged approach to upscale the livelihoods of farming communities through land & water development, and promote advanced agriculture practices. In the launch ceremony, Shri Pattnaik appreciated the efforts of Vedanta & NABARD for their efforts towards enhancing the income levels of the farmers through this project. He urged the farmers to reap the benefits of this project along with utilizing the other government agricultural schemes available to them.
Mohapatra appealed to the farmers asking them to take the help of the agricultural scientists at their disposal, so that they can double their income from the same piece of land they used to cultivate earlier. Sahoo & Kumar, speaking on behalf of Vedanta, assured constant and dedicated support from their side for this project.
The pilot project has been flagged off at Siriapali village with identified households in the first phase, with SEWA acting as the implementing agency.  The ultimate goal of the project is to secure economic prosperity among identified households by ensuring enhanced income of targeted households by the end of the project period through integrated interventions in agriculture and natural resource management.
As a part of this project, NABARD and KVK intend to organize farmers into village level institutions or Farmers Club. One such institution, Amar Jyoti Farmers Club, has already been formed. The clubs would work on improving farmers’ access to assured source of irrigation and land development measures for round the year diversified crop cultivation, advanced practices of agriculture and allied sources of income, bio-fertilizer and bio-pesticides and to ensure its utilization by project farmers.
The programme was attended by 120 potential farmers of Siriapali village.
