Dryland Agriculture is the key to watershed management!
Anantapur district’s recovery from chronic drought and significant success in reversal of the process desertification needs a revisit. The debilitating nature of repetitive droughts caused repeated famines because of crop loss triggered by missing monsoons. "According to Government records 18 years in the new millennium of 21 years have been drought hit" says Dr. Malla Reddy Director of Accion Fraterna Ecology Centre an NGO accredited by the Government of Andhra Pradesh to combat desertification in Anantapur. Enterprising rural women have successfully availed of the benefits of Women Groups self-managed micro finance interventions too… running small businesses, making traditional snacks like milled flour fryums, confectionaries etc. Another unexpected offshoot has been that these kind of traditional nutritive snacks helped improve the iron content in the blood supply of children and the villagers in and around Kalyandurg. People suffering from endocrine disorders like diabet...