Women farmers

Meet five extraordinary changemakers transforming Indian agriculture with bold ideas, indigenous wisdom, and innovations that are quietly reshaping the way India farms, eats, and thrives. This September, Optum Presents The Better India Showcase, supported by the M3M Foundation, is honouring their impact.

Bibi Fatima Women’s Self-Help Group from Dharwad’s Teertha village wins UNDP’s Equator Initiative Award for pioneering sustainable farming practices, millet revival initiatives, and unwavering commitment to food and nutritional security.

Kerala’s Coonfresh earns Rs 50 lakh/year and has trained 10,000 farmers — all started by a homemaker and her husband with just 2 mushroom packets.

Fertiliser sprays, flying drones, and financial freedom — these 5 real stories show what happens when women farmers get access to the skies.

When her grandmother longed for a lost grain, Dimum Pertin set out to revive Adlay millet — and ended up sparking a movement that’s nourishing her community through her brainchild, ‘Gepo Aali’.

College dropout Ashish Ranjan started OCB (Online Cake Bhejo) in 2017 with his friend Buddhisen Bittu. The chain of bakeries employs and empowers over 50 women farmers in Bihar who make millet cookies, muffins, brownies and more.

Using organic farming to empower women, Reeva Sood grows ashwagandha, sarpagandha, black wheat, stevia, lemongrass and more on her unique farm in Una, Himachal Pradesh.

From spreading awareness and sensitizing farmers, monitoring fields for rescue, initiating a contractual ban on child labour, incentivising those who refrained from it to implementing penalties upon violation, Bayer's Child Care Program (CCP) has been tackling the problem of child labour with a multi-layered approach.

Women farmers of Maharashtra's drought-prone Marathwada are building a better future through an innovative organic farming model that saves water and doubles production

"These women were stuck in the daily rigmarole of managing the kitchen, kids and the household. But now they were emerging as faces of a widespread change."