Bamboo in Orissa: Trade and Livelihood Perspective - Vasundhara

More documents

Recommendations

Info

All rights reserved by VASUNDHARA(www.vasundharaorissa.org). For any clarification, contact author at sunlit1968@yahoo.co.in those areas. Bonai and Athmallik have been quite well known among the OFDC people where these migrant cutters could be booked. Prahlad Nayak believes that about 2000 cutters used to migrate from the Bonai area. A contradictory situation was observed in the Pokharigochha area(Nayagarh dist.) when the operations were started in January 2005. The local people being very poor, it was to be normally expected that most of them would be interested to join the cutting operations. However, the concerned RMP had to invite about 70 cutters from the neighbouring state when it found a shortage of local cutters. What actually happened was that some of the villagers being still busy in their agricultural work, and some having migrated to other areas during the period of suspended operations; a shortfall was noticed in the number of local cutters(per comm., Birat Jani). Since the operation was started quite late hence the RMP could hardly afford managing with whatever local strength of the cutters. Suspension of bamboo harvesting severely affected the livelihood of the poor in many areas. For instance, in Gajalbadi area the local people lost employment for about 9 lakh mandays, which in turn had a devastating impact on the local small business, as the shopowners’ fate was closely associated with the income of the bamboo labourers. Financial misery even affected the cultural life because people did not have enough money to afford the famous danda nacha (a traditional dance festival) of their area(RCDC, op.cit., p.7). 2. Artisans (bamboo-weavers): A survey in 2001-02 by the Directorate of Handicrafts and Cottage Industries(DHCI), Orissa has put the number bamboo & cane artisans in the state at 27332 (for details, see annexure-4 ). However, this estimate is controversial as it is not in consistency with some other estimates. For instance, the following table shows the number of bamboo artisans under the jurisdiction of Nayagarh Forest Divn. as 2400 which is more or less supported by the independent estimation given by the Nayagarh Jungle Surakshya Mahasangh(see annexure-6). However, the DHCI survey puts the number of bamboo/cane artisans in Nayagarh district at 64 only. The inconsistency may be due to a census in the strict sense of the term 'artisan' because, as mentioned earlier, mere basketry does not necessary mean artistic work. 57
All rights reserved by VASUNDHARA(www.vasundharaorissa.org). For any clarification, contact author at sunlit1968@yahoo.co.in Forest Division No. of bamboo artisans Caste/community Boudh 2000 Betara Sambalpur 5000 Mahara & Turi Khariar and 2160 Paharia/kamar Sunabeda WL Kalahandi (South) 600 Paharia/kamar Bolangir (east & west) About 150 HHs of Paharia and unknown number of other caste people Mahara, Turi and Paharia Nayagarh 2400 Hadi and Dom Keonjhar (territorial 2863 Dom and wildlife) Total 15023 [quoted from various sources, in the paper entitled Plight of Bamboo Artisans in Orissa and circulated by Ramakanta Patra of RCDC in the state-level workshop on nationalised NTFPs, organised in April 2004. The above figure(total) excludes the number of artisans in 23 districts, but at the same time includes children who are full time workers in this trade. ] Assessing the exact number of bamboo artisans is very difficult. At Bainsia village(Dhenkanal district) the artisan villagers put the estimate for their district at 10000 HHs though it would be safe to limit this figure between 2000 to 3000 (in fact, in the DHCI survey this number is 3124). In Jagatsinghpur district, the estimate, as given by artisans of Sahada village on the basis of village-wise statistics, comes to be around 350 HHs though in the DHCI survey this number is much higher i.e., 1552. Most of the bamboo-ware/craft is related to the demand during agricultural season, hence the production is influenced a lot by the extent of agricultural practices in an area. It is for this reason that % of artisans concentrated in the coastal districts and their neighbourhood seem to be significantly higher than in the hilly and forested areas of western, northern and southern Orissa. For instance, the DHCI survey indicates that the concentration in 11 coastal districts alone (Balasore, Bhadrak, Cuttack, Jagatsinghpur, Jajpur, Kendrapara, Dhenkanal, Ganjam,Puri, Khurdha and Nayagarh) is 46.19%.In fact, many of the artisan families have migrated to western Orissa under different circumstances and are now known there under other names(caste) though they clarify that originally they belong to the coastal area, as we could find at Munder near Sambalpur. The artisans depend on bamboo weaving ideally for the whole year, but practically speaking owing to the major fluctuations in the demand of their products, some families do not expect a consistency in the income from this source though out the year. Difficulty in access to the raw material sources(jungles) during the rainy season makes some of them helpless despite the demand, as seen in the Sariapada village of Dhenkanal district(Source: Sachitra Vijaya). 58
Page 1 and 2:
All rights reserved by VASUNDHARA(w
Page 3 and 4:
Page 5 and 6:
Page 7 and 8: All rights reserved by VASUNDHARA(w
Page 57: All rights reserved by VASUNDHARA(w
Page 101: All rights reserved by VASUNDHARA(w
show all

Bamboo in Orissa: Trade and Livelihood Perspective - Vasundhara

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?