Empowering Women through Dairy Training: UW partnership with the Gandhi Trust in UP
Even though India is the world’s largest milk-producing country, in Uttar Pradesh, about 40% of poor women farmers and their families suffer from insufficient nutrients for a healthy life. Animal husbandry and dairy offers a good scope for rural development in India. But, although women are the backbone of agricultural workforce, they are often constrained by limited access to formal knowledge sources, markets, technologies and social networks. Our partnership with The Rajiv Gandhi Charitable Trust through their implementation of women’s self help groups has been pivotal in delivering dairy trainings to women farmers, overcoming the gendergaps existing in these activities.
Connie Cordoba is a veterinarian with a Master’s degree in Dairy Science. She is currently working as an Outreach Specialist in the Dairy Science Department, where she became involved in an USAID funded project to increase productivity in dairy production in order to improve women farmer’s income. Her role is to teaching women farmers best management practices for dairy cattle, buffaloes and goats. She will be returning this month with a travel grant given by the Global Health Institute to set up internship programs for graduate students.