Introduction It’s a luxury to know where your food comes from. Dr. Vanaja Ramprasad, Managing Trustee, Green Foundation began the workshop by sharing her... Read more...   About the seminar The multi-faceted seminar cum workshop engaged innovative techniques to provoke thought and collate diverse reactions on various issues. It departed from the usual tradition to focus on topics related to a specific subject... Read more...   Session One Impact of Free trade on Small farmers Speaker: Dr. Devinder Sharma Dr. Sharma began his speech by re-calling the caption of a cartoon – We Take Over - published on 01 Jan 1995... Read more...   Session Two Point-Counter point Speakers: Mr. K.C.Raghu & Mr. Venkata Subramanian They gave their respective and usually contrasting views on various issues. Read more...     Session Three - Panel 01 Formal Structures- Models for organising farmer’s access to market Chaired by Mr. Ramesh Harve 1) Indian Organic Farmers Producer Company Ltd. The Producer Company Speakers: Mr. John Cherian 2) Access to Markets Through Cooperatives Speakers: Ramesh Harve 3) Emerging Urban Markets – can they help rural women? Speakers: K Raghavendra Rao and Srikanta Murthy Read more...   Session Three - Panel 02 Access to markets for small farmers - Can certification lead the way? Chaired by Prof G K Veeresh 1) Certification and Standards – A Gateway to accessing markets Speakers: Dr. Mallika Mathew 2) Experiences of INDOCERT in ICS and GROUP Certification Speakers: Mr. Sreekumar M S 3) Participatory Guarantee Systems Speakers: Mr. Mathew John Read more...   Session Three - Panel 03 Innovative Approaches – Women and Market Access Chaired by Ms. Bharti Patel 1) Just Change India Producer Company Limited Speakers: Ms. Shikha 2) Women and access to markets – a Case study in conservation Speakers: Sunita Rao of Vanastree 3) Women driven Producer Consumer Co-operation Speakers: Mr. Ghate Read more...   Session Three - Panel 04 Direct Marketing by Farmers – Role of Consumer Support Chaired by Dr. Jeevan Kumar 1) Consumer perspective in community supported agriculture (CSA) Speakers: Jayashree Janardhan 2) Constraints for sustainability of rural livelihood and experiences of accepting challenges by organic farmer groups Speakers: Mr. Abhay Mutalik Desai 3) Requirements of effective marketing that included awareness on organic food products Speakers: Mr. N Chandrakumar Read more...     Session Three - Panel 05 Interventions by NGOs to facilitate access to market Chaired by Mr. Mathew 1) Tribal Health Initiative manages a community health programme in.. Speakers: Dr. Lalitha 2) Timbaktu Collectives Speakers: Mr. Dinesh 3) Marketing interventions and Institutional structures for Organic.... Speakers: Mr. M Suresh and Ms. K Vijayalakshmi 4) Blue label for fish products. Speaker: Dr. Bhatta Read more...   Session Four Cities gobbling agricultural land Speakers: Mr. Ashok Doraiswamy. Trustee, GREEN Foundation Mr. Ashok Doraiswamy began by sharing statistics that illustrated the diseconomies of scale arising in the Indian economy as 25% of one category of work force (services sector) is contributing to 60% of the GDP while 60% of another category (agriculture) inherently there are. In comparison, in the US, agriculture accounts for 7.7% of the GDP and not more than 2 % of the work force is employed in agriculture. Less and less people are trying to produce more and more food. If agriculture is labour intensive and not as much productive.. Read more...   Session Five A small farm can be best managed, a small farmer cannot be. Speaker: Dr R S Deshpande, is currently the Director of the Institute for Social and Economic Change (ISEC), Bangalore, an all-India Institute of interdisciplinary research and training in social sciences. Director of ISAC, Institute for Social and Economic Change in Bangalore. Dr. Deshpande has contributed significantly as member of the many policy bodies which include Advisory Body of the Ministry of Commerce, Government of India, WTO Cell of Government of India,... Read more...   Session Six Summary of Group Discussions General issues surrounding organic agriculture in India • Limited market access, but expanding market opportunities • Professionalism based on ecological principles for packaging, storage and.. Summary by Dr. Vanaja Ramprasad The seminar on Farmers, Livelihood and Trade was well timed  to focus on  the  global food crisis and its impact on small farmers in the developing countries. Read more...     Acknowledgements | Annexures | Home GREEN Foundation