Brand Ananya Launched

Brand Ananya Launched

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This Women’s Day was particularly exciting for the 150 women in Bipradaspur Gram Panchayat in Sunderbans. The GP in Gosaba in South 24 Parganas (West Bengal) witnessed the launch of “Ananya”. Over 300 women, girls, SMC members, panchayat members, teachers and students came together at Chandipur village to celebrate International Women's Day on 9 March 2023. 

In fact on the day of the launch itself they managed to earn Rs 2000 through the sale of their produce!

Ananya is the brand of organic raw honey and aromatic Gobindbhog rice promoted by the women of 11 Self Help Groups in the Panchayat. “We selected the honey and rice because of its availability and demand. Raw honey is easily available in Sundarbans specially in the orchards. Moreover, there is a huge demand for honey in the market here. And of all the other rice varieties, Gobindbhog rice has a high return on investment,” says Moitrayee Mondal, Humanitarian Programme Coordinator, Oxfam India.

This initiative of procuring and packaging was undertaken with the support of Microsoft India. The SHGs were provided with raw honey and rice, weighing machine, packaging machine and packaging material such as glass jars. They were trained on processing and the packaging of the product. In order to market their produce, the SHG members are being linked with the local markets and connecting them with organisers of melas and conferences.

This initiative has given a new ray of hope for many women, especially women-led households, to a better life. Forty-two-year-old Suchitra Giri is a widow and lives with her three children in Manmathanagar Mouja village. She is the sole breadwinner—she is a part time fisherwoman and a part time daily wage labourer. A member of the Bhumi SHG, Suchitra and the other SHG members were trained on honey processing, packaging and marketing.

“We supported them with 129 kg honey, glass jars for packaging, plastic sheets, and hot gun to make the bottles leakage proof,” added Moitrayee. Suchitra along with the others have now started engaging with many big vendors to sell their produce in the nearby markets. Whatever they make from the sale of the produce at present is being divided among the SHG members but the plan later is to start re-investing in the SHG to expand their business to make more procurements in future.

Suchitra is hopeful that this additional money from the sale of honey will help reduce her excessive burden and drudgery. This will also mean a better, a more comfortable life for herself and her children.

For the SHG this is a very exciting opportunity. Until they were involved in the regular SHG activities of savings and credit system. Women took loans for marriage, construction of houses, and health emergencies. Now the women members of the SHG have also been trained on preparing organic manure to promote organic farming as well as provided with organic seeds to develop their own kitchen gardens.

Thirty-year-old Sujata Mondal chips in. “I am extremely happy that we started this small business. My husband has offered his total support to make it a profitable business. We need Oxfam's support in connecting us to buyers and help us in developing a marketing strategy so that we can do many more batches of honey”. Sujata belongs to the Ramakrishna SHG.

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