Story link: http://www.goodnewsindia.com/index.php/Supplement/article/signs-from-a-village-fair

Badiadka is a village on the border of Karnataka and Kerala. It’s a half hour drive from Kasargod town in Kerala. For three years now it has been running an annual Agriculture Fair (Krishi Mela) where the highlight is the display of devices and implements of great use to farmers. About 5000 people visit the one day fair.

Among the organisers we have the tireless Shree Padre who founded ‘Adike Patrike’ --a farmers’ participatory magazine-- and who is now a water harvesting evangelist. He writes, “Most of the devices exhibited were developed by practising farmers all over India.” He might have added, that only the brave and the sure can offer a product for evaluation and purchase by an Indian farmer: he’s a hardy customer.

This year’s fair took place on Dec 20 and if you need more information regarding participation or on how to display a product of your own you may mail Mr Ganapathy Bhat at . His phone numbers are (04994) 285282, 285622 and 9447449916.

But for GoodNewsIndia readers who are not farmers, there is an interesting trend to savour. Just scan the list of products on display at a small village and try to gain an idea of where India is headed. Today news of India’s feel-good, glamour-laden IT and NRI achievements are everywhere. But you would scarce guess that the energy that shows up at the top is at work in rural India as well. For proof scan this list from the Badiadka Fair, which is reproduced with very little editing:

Machine for spraying Bordeaux Mixture to arecanut tree

A manual milking machine

Fodder, green leaf cutting machine

An attachment to carry milk cans on mobikes

Italian Mellifera bee boxes

Tender coconut openers

Arecanut dehusking devices

CART pump

Water saving tippy-tap

Demonstration of electronic fence

Box to produce Vermicompost from coconut leaves

Multi-purpose Mini-Dryer

Weeding machines

Pit digging Machines

Improved Hand carts

One wheeled Cart

Smokeless Chulha

Demonstration of taking out Tender Coconut Snowball

Demonstration of Rope-way

Low-cost Silpaulin Drier

Mobile Trolley to keep agriculture tools

Different clamps to hang Vanilla vines

Automatic timers for irrigation pump sets

TataMobile Tipper equipped with hydraulic lift

Coconut dehusking devices

Medicinal plants display and sales

Coconut and Arecanut tree-climbing devices

Demo of Rubber sheetmaking using buttermilk instead of acid

Demonstration of Azolla as a cattle feed supplement

Hydro ram water lifter

Arecanut turner

Mini turbines

Machine to stir bio-gas slurry

Home-level powdering machine

Manual device to separate pepper berries from bunches

Areca medicine for diabetes

Home-made food items

eMail from Shree Padre