The products coming out of her initiative Tadhvanam from this remote village in Davanagere district have reached different parts of the country and globe.
It was in 1987 that Saroja took the tiny step of entrepreneurship by starting a dairy farm and starting a unit to make coir products to bring her family’s economic position back on track. This initiative gave her first lessons in earning money from home.
63-year-old Saroja Nagendrappa Patil from Nitturu village in Harihar taluk not only grows crops organically, but also adds value to her produce, increasing her earnings. She has now become a model for the womenfolk in the region.
She also took up teaching fellow women and men farmers through an agriculture department initiative and taught them how to use available resources in their neighborhood, organic pest management and other ways of growing crops. Her stint at guiding other farmers made her a better leader and also gave her new ideas to grow crops naturally. Though initial successes were small, sustained efforts helped her in enriching the family’s 30-acre plot that gave her ever better yields.