Biodiversity Conservation Network
3. Tasar Silk and Honey in the Mountains of Garhwal
Location: Garhwal, Uttar Pradesh, India
Partners: Appropriate Technology International (ATI)
EDA Rural Systems
Kumaun University
Community EnterprisesProject Title: Biodiversity Conservation Through Small Producers' Enhanced Commercial Utilization of Natural Resources in the Garhwal Himalayas of India
BCN Funding: $571,201 Partner Contribution: $803,397
Grant Period: September 1, 1995 - August 31, 1998
Project Overview
The mountainous Garhwal district, which contains some of India's holiest pilgrimage sites, is rich in botanical diversity. It is also home to the endangered snow leopard, black bear, bharal deer, and musk deer. The principal threats to the region's biodiversity are unsustainable levels of fuelwood and fodder collection, grazing, and harvesting of non-timber forest products. To counter these threats, the project is working to establish community-based oak tasar silk and honey production enterprises in three watersheds in the Chamoli District of Garhwal.
The tasar silkworms (Antheraea proylei)use oak leaves from village and state owned forests as their food source. The silk enterprise will be divided into a centrally run grainage that will produce silkworm seed eggs for sale to community members, household run rearing enterprises that will use oak leaves to rear the silkworms, and a centrally operated silk reeling and marketing enterprise that will take the cocoons and process them to form silk thread that will be sold to cloth manufacturers.
The honey enterprise will involve community-based honey production initially for local sale and subsequently to religious pilgrims visiting the area and possibly for urban and international sale. Bee hives will be placed near people's houses with the bees foraging for nectar in natural forests, alpine meadows, and agricultural lands. These enterprises will strengthen local community institutions including forest management committees (van panchayats)and women's groups.
1996 Accomplishments
The project made major strides in hiring and training staff, developing and instituting biological and socio-economic monitoring plans, holding village level meetings to organize implementation activities, and establishing the silk and honey enterprises.
To date, thirty-one villagers have received training in silkworm rearing practices. Silkworm rearing was undertaken by twenty producers in March, 1996 at Chawkie Rearing Centers in the Akash Kamini Valley. The first cocoon crop yielded a harvest of approximately 20,000 cocoons. Nine producers were involved in the second crop that yielded 44,000 cocoons. All cocoons are being kept to be used in future rearings, hence no reeling activities have taken place. One hundred locally manufactured bee boxes have been sold to villagers. Sixteen villagers have attended a three month training in bee keeping and honey production.
Success Stories
When villagers in Akash Kamini valley harvested their first ever tasar crop from oak leaves, it was like "seeing is believing." Villagers, particularly women, began to see a value addition to their time and efforts - which otherwise go unvalued and unaccounted - when they received the return for their produce. Beginning with a zero skill base a year before, today the project has developed basic or intermediate level skills in 24 families. Silkworm rearing provides work for both women and men. Promoting the concept of "tasar as a family enterprise" will hopefully result in a "family stake" towards the enterprise activities and sustainable harvest of oak leaves. Initially, the project started enterprise activity with one larger group, but now villagers have opted for smaller cohesive groups to undertake the activities. The villagers feel that producer organizations of a few like minded families will facilitate sustainable use of oak leaves and better distribution of tasks among themselves.
The bee box honey production system was demonstrated to the villagers, resulting in further demands for bee boxes by the villagers to be covered in installment payments. The group of sixteen trainees (five women and eleven men) after completion of their four month beekeeping course, spread the needed technical know-how for Apis ceranabees and awareness of flora conservation in and around the villages. Their knowledge was further upgraded with training sessions from outside bee experts.
Finally, under the guidance of senior botanists, the project is collecting biological information from the field and the community. Having observed the fact that the oak forest nearby is a source of food to silkworms, villagers are realizing the greater importance of oak trees, regeneration of oak seedlings and are observing the sprouting and maturity behavior of oak leaves. Villagers are becoming aware of (and debating) the problems associated with regeneration of Quercus semecarpifolia.This awareness will help promote a "community system" of conservation.
Challenges
This was the year of unexpected torrential rains which caused many hardships to the producers of honey as well as tasar cocoons. The much envisaged expansion of tasar and honey was constrained by limited supplies of parent tasar eggs and Apis ceranabee colonies. A viral disease affected the second rearing of silkworms, reducing anticipated production from 150,000 - 200,000 to only 44,000 cocoons. Further, since tasar and bee box systems are not traditional technologies, the local skill base is developing slowly. Developing in-house basic facilities like a cocoon preservation center, grainage for eggs, and a honey processing plant are also constrained by an inconsistent electricity supply. Perhaps the greatest challenge is procuring timely help from the government. Systematic appropriation of the rights of village based Van Panchayatinstitutions by the government is making the village communities less effective in regulating the free riders and law breakers.
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