Informal Sector

Featured Articles
October 17, 2022
Invisible informal groundwater markets
While informal groundwater markets cater significantly to the needs of smallholder farmers in India, they continue to be unacknowledged and understudied.
Groundwater, a finite resource (Image Source: TV Manoj via Wikimedia Commons)
December 7, 2020
Not in the interest of women farmers!
The new farm related bills will spell doom for women workers who form the bulk of small and marginal sections of Indian agriculture, warns Mahila Kisan Adhikaar Manch (MAKAAM).
Farm women, overworked and underpaid (Image Source: India Water Portal)
November 18, 2019
Free septic tank cleaning in Delhi; CM attempts to reduce sewer deaths
Policy matters this week
Image credit: Sharada Prasad
October 21, 2019
In conversation with K. J. Joy of SOPPECOM
In this interview, Joy talks about his work as an activist working in rural Maharashtra, and how he came to work on water conflicts in India.
KJ Joy speaks at a felicitation for the late Professor Ramaswamy Iyer.
September 24, 2019
Manual scavenging is inhumane: SC
Policy matters this week
Despite the ban, manual scavenging continues. (Image courtesy: The Hindu)
September 13, 2019
How to restrict crops to geographically sustainable areas: The case of arecanut in Tumkur
Arecanut farmers in Karnataka are reeling from dipping groundwater levels and infrequent water supply for irrigation. In this article, some solutions are proposed.
Young arecanut trees grown in drylands of Tumkur region (Gubbi Taluk, Hodalur Village) Pic Credit: Chandana Eswar
Catering to the aspirations of frontline workers to ensure water security for rural India
Reimagining a blue future by bridging the ever increasing capacity gap in the sector.
Gurudutt Ramachandra
Posted on 01 Jul, 2020 06:26 PM

The Covid-19 pandemic has reinforced the need to create jobs locally. This intersects with the water sector's need for local management. How do we create meaningful opportunities to address the aspirations of the local talent pool and make them discoverable?
There is a significant demand for skilled human resources in the water sector (Image: Neil Palmer, IWMI Flickr Photos; CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
Boosting rural livelihoods using agriculture and MGNREGA amidst Covid-19
Strengthening farm and non-farm livelihoods can pave the way for food and nutritional security.
Sneha Kaushal
Ashutosh Nanda
PRADAN
Posted on 28 Jun, 2020 10:13 AM

As the Covid-19 pandemic was leaving deep scars around the globe, it forced governments to take measures to protect citizens and ensure food security for its people. In India, initially, it looked as if the remote rural areas would skirt the pandemic.
MGNREGA can play an important role in integration of migrant labour in the rural economy (Image: Ashutosh Nanda)
India’s deepening water crisis - need for a response at scale
Capacity building and data should not be seen as one-time activities but as a foundation for impactful, sustainable, large scale programmes.
Surbhi Arul
Bishwadeep Ghose
Posted on 01 Jun, 2020 03:22 PM

The water crisis in India has been in the making for sometime now, and the current COVID-19 pandemic has further brought to fore the challenges of safe water and hygiene, necessary for survival.
Residents of a village built a farm-pond and repurposed it to suit their needs (Source: IWP Flickr photos)
Lockdown puts citymakers at risk
The forced exodus of the migrants who built our cities indicates how they were shortchanged on every front.
Impact and Policy Research Institute
Posted on 28 May, 2020 01:22 PM

Suddenly thrown out of work by a nationwide lockdown, the migrants who built our cities and our economies were forced to take the torturous walk away from the cities to their homes in rural India.
A worker at a construction site (Image: ILO/ Joydeep Mukherjee; NC-ND 3.0 IGO License)
Covid-19 could push 260 million Indians into poverty: Research
News this week
Swati Bansal
Posted on 20 May, 2020 10:42 AM

Nearly 260 million Indian could be pushed to poverty due to Covid-19: Researchers
Covid-19 could push 260 million Indians into poverty (Image Source: IWP Flickr photos)
Building resilience of communities during and beyond Covid-19
Interventions that increase dependencies and use of local resources to resolve challenges locally can help increase resilience of farmers.
Manisha Shah
Kiran Kumar Sen
Gurudutt Ramachandra
Posted on 14 May, 2020 01:12 PM

Covid-19 pandemic has unleashed multiple challenges in different geographies, especially for the vulnerable groups living in areas that already have existing issues of water and food security.
People were following social distancing in villages while collecting water (Image: INREM)
Need to build inclusive cities in the post-pandemic world
It’s time that public policy focuses on a radical re-envisioning of urban spaces and on improving social inclusion of migrants in urban settings.
Amita Bhaduri
Posted on 12 May, 2020 08:36 PM

When migrants headed home after Covid-19 lockdown 1.0, Sarojini was suddenly caught off-guard. She decided against moving, after an initial urge to leave for her village in Samastipur, Bihar. Her two sons stay with her at Delhi, doing daily wage labour work, while she works as a domestic help.
Migrants on their way home during the countrywide lockdown (Image: Stranded Workers Action Network)
Coping with Covid-19: Options before small and marginal farmers of rainfed regions
There is a need to have basic institutional structures such as market, credit, insurance, research, extension service etc., in place in rainfed regions.
Biswanath Sinha
Kuntal Mukherjee
Posted on 09 May, 2020 03:11 PM

The global crisis due to Covid-19 has hit India after coursing through western Europe. India’s response to curtail the spread of the disease was quite decisive.
Village institutions take a lead in Covid-19 response
Institutions are a key arsenal in rural India's pandemic fight.
Kiran Singh
Foundation for Ecological Security (FES)
Posted on 07 May, 2020 09:23 PM

Covid-19 will have major implications in rural areas where the Foundation for Ecological Security (FES), a non-profit organisation has been working towards conservation of natural resources through collective action of local communities. Experience indicates that the complete lockdown to contain the spread of the disease has resulted in loss of rural incomes.
In the light of disrupted food supply systems, especially for fresh produce, the village institution arranged for harvesting and sale of produce. (Image: FES)
Transforming lives in the Covid-19 context: MGNREGS and its potential
India can use its flagship public employment program (MGNREGS) to transform lives of its underprivileged population in the Covid-19 context, and live up to its promise of a welfare state.
Karthik Seshan
Ayan Biswas
Posted on 05 May, 2020 04:11 PM

As India continues to unravel the actual scale of economic impacts in a world infested by the dangerous Covid-19 virus, lingering images of daily wage labourers and migrant workers attempting a near impossible walk home have been etched in public consciousness.
Women working on an NREGA site building a pond to assist in farming and water storage. Gopalpura, Jhabua, Madhya Pradesh (Image: UN Women/Gaganjit Singh, Flickr Commons)
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