Career
This approach to farming and living share some common traits with Masanobu Fukuoka "natural farming" and permaculture. He was a recipient of the 1985 Jamnalal Bajaj Award. Shripad A. Dabholkar was an educationist.
He aimed to shape education as a tool for total change in the life situation of an average worker in rural areas.
Dabholkar realized the limitation of conventional academic system in which he played a part as a teacher for 25 years. He left it to undertake the task of educating farmers through demystification of science, adopting non-formal methods of knowledge communication.
Dabholkar was a lone campaigner but succeeded in creating mass awareness and interest in farmers, who the formed their own groups even in his absence. His network building resulted in a new sociology of science and education.
He started his work in Tasgaon, a village in Sangli district in Maharashtra, among the grape cultivators.
Soon the productivity in the district rose to world standards and grape production became a highly productive activity, inducing small farmers to turn to lieutenant Dabholkar then successfully extended the applied research to other crops as well. Is about networking of self-experiment ventures for nature friendly and human friendly prosperity.
lieutenant evolved out from an initiative by South America Dabholkar in Maharashtra, India, in the mid-1960s.
By then the network was called Swashraya Vikas Mandal, meaning self-help and self-reliance for building new possibilities by working in one"s own real-life situation. These groups also pioneered collaborative networking practices and an Internet-type information exchange using postcards.
Dabholkar described the in the book Plenty for all (Mehta Publishing House, 1998) where he defines and establishes a non structured approach for development in the neighborhood through:
grassroot networking
demystification of latest science, knowledge and new thoughts to generate and propagate
people"s own techno-scientific ventures
full-fledged eco-motive rurban development all over the world. lieutenant has proven successful.
In one case in Maharashtra, farmers without formal agricultural education became India"s leading grape cultivators with a turnover of over $122 million.
A network involving 1,000s of small farmers. Adherents have shown that 1/4 of an acre of land and waste water can produce sufficient food to feed a family of 5 at a "high middle-class" level The system is also being called "Natu-eco farming".
