Reviving Millets in Bundelkhand
Kodo and kutki fed this plateau for centuries before they were dismissed as poor mans grain. Farmers are returning to them.
Bundelkhand is a hard place to farm. Rainfall is erratic, the soil is thin, and irrigation reaches only a fraction of the land. For centuries, farmers here grew what suited those conditions: kodo, kutki, sanwa — millets that need no irrigation and tolerate a failed monsoon.
What changed
The shift to wheat and paddy came with subsidised inputs and assured procurement. Millets had neither. Within two generations they were reframed as a grain of last resort.
What is changing back
The return has been driven by three things at once: groundwater tables that no longer support paddy, a market that now pays a premium for millets, and farmers who never fully stopped growing them.
We work with 140 farming families across 11 villages. The agreement is simple — a floor price fixed before sowing, so the risk of a bad year does not sit entirely with the farmer.