Manav Seva Sansthan wins STAR Impact Award

Manav Seva Sansthan (MSS), 2008 Development  Marketplace winner, recently won the STAR Impact Award. The award recognizes and supports local organisations that  achieve excellence in the provision of services to disadvantaged children and that demonstrate effective management practices. Winners receive $100,000 in unrestricted funding, tailored consultancy support and media training.

Under the Development Marketplace project, MSS works to provide excluded women and their families with legal rights to land through a collective/group land  ownership rights model. The concept of collective land ownership for ensuring women control of land and building women’s leadership in agriculture based livelihood is unique in the Indian context. MSS is successfully carrying out “collective land and collective farming” with small farmers using Low External Input Sustainable Agriculture (LEISA) techniques.

The project optimizes returns for a women’s collective by doubling annual incomes and encouraging collective land ownership, enabling them to use modern agrotechniques and access to credit and farm inputs available through state and private institutions. The project  advocates for reforms in state land allocation policy towards collective ownership and encourages replication of the model.

Learn more about the project and MSS here.