On January 23, we launched the Green Rural Economy platform at a two-day event at the School of Ancient Wisdom in north Bengaluru. In part 2, we delve into the features of the platform and the issues that need to be addressed for it to be an effective platform for change.
Blogs
Urban Water Programme
Rural Futures Programme
Products and Platforms
Community and Outreach
Applied Research
Jaltol and Johads: Tracking the Impact of Watershed Management in Rajasthan
Ahead of the Data for Water Security Hackathon, we put together this use case to help demonstrate how Jaltol could potentially be used to more accurately measure how water management efforts by Tarun Bharat Sangh is impacting the region.
The Launch of a Consortium-Led Platform to Build Green Rural Economies
On January 23, we launched the Green Rural Economy platform at a two-day workshop at the School of Ancient Wisdom in north Bengaluru. This is part one of a blog series that summarises the intent of the platform and the way forward based on discussions at the event.
WELL Labs Partners with IHE Delft, ACIWRM to Develop Community-Driven Data Solutions
WELL Labs has partnered with ACIWRM and IHE Delft to understand and improve community-driven applications of remote sensing data in India’s Krishna river basin.
Remote Sensing in Rajasthan: Can Jaltol Buttress Traditional Johads?
We team up with Tarun Bharat Sangh to see how remote sensing can aid planning, impact evaluation and scaling up for johads, the traditional earthen embankments that are key to water conservation efforts in Rajasthan
Field Notes from Lohardaga: Easing How Jharkhand’s Grassroots Workers Access Knowledge
As part of the Green Rural Livelihoods project, we visited Lohardaga and got insights from the ground on how grassroots organisations like PRADAN support the livelihoods of local communities. We summarise five insights in the second part of this series.
Field Notes from Lohardaga: How a Grassroots Organisation in Jharkhand Shares Knowledge
As part of the Green Rural Economy project, we visited Lohardaga and got insights from the ground on how grassroots organisations like PRADAN support local communities with best practices on land and water management. We summarise our learnings in this two-part blog series.
How Often are India’s Farming Patterns Changing? With IIT Delhi, We Turn to New Land Use Maps for Answers
Remote sensing data validated through reports from the ground can capture changes in spatial agricultural patterns down to plot level. This blog sheds light on land use maps developed by IIT Delhi called IndiaSAT.
Rural Water Security: How Our Vision for Jaltol Has Progressed
WELL Labs is co-developing with its partners simple user-friendly tools, under the Jaltol framework, to help us diagnose the magnitude of water mismanagement and track our progress towards water security.
Can Playbooks Promote Green Rural Livelihoods? Insights from Conversations With CSOs
Under the Green Rural Livelihoods project, we are working with Rainmatter Foundation to create how-to guides and playbooks.
Data to Insights: WELL Labs Tool Sifts Through Crop Statistics and Finds Cropping Patterns Within
In this blog, we explain how to use the agricultural statistics tool we developed that makes it easy to read and interpret data and thus build a more complete picture of a landscape and its cropping patterns.
How Are Farmers Likely to Respond to Solar Irrigation? Insights from Our Modelling Exercise Covering 6 Districts
To our knowledge, this is the first research study that has attempted to apply the agent-based modelling method in the context of solar irrigation and its likely impact on farmers’ incomes and groundwater sustainability in India.
Field Notes from Jharkhand: Testing Jaltol on The Ground With WASSAN
By collating secondary data and allowing for grassroots communities to input specific primary data, Jaltol can address the data and technical gap that impairs water budgeting and rural water planning.
Jaltol & Water Security: How Do We Track Impact at a Finer Scale?
Our partnership with the Foundation for Ecological Security (FES) to improve the practical use of Jaltol has sharpened the need for a higher quality of metrics for evapotranspiration data.
Can Farmers Make More Money While Using Less Water?
Farmers need to be able to transition to crops that use less water but yield a higher profit. This was the basis of an agent-based modelling exercise we did in six states.
‘A Gamble like the Stock Market’ in India’s Onion Belt
As erratic rain and unstable markets plague onion farming in Maharashtra’s Ahmednagar, an FPO looks into protections from extreme weather
Field Notes from Anantapur’s Tomato Markets
At a time when tomato prices skyrocket in cities, piles of tomatoes lay discarded in the countryside. In Anantapur, farmers dump tomatoes despite having Asia’s largest tomato mandi in the next district