Pashu Nurse is a semi-literate or illiterate woman trained under structured classrooms & field practice and then review and support in fieldwork over a period of one year to provide basic improved practices knowledge and preventative and herb-based home remedies at low cost and first symptom. Basically, she is a goat rearer herself who demonstrates, advocates, and disseminates knowledge and skill actively for the betterment of her nearby goat farmers within the village. Experiences by a number of grassroots organizations suggest that a village-based knowledge extension service cum preventative health care service through training local small livestock farming women had proven an effective strategy to improve management and reduce mortality & morbidity on a significant scale.
Our Innovation
The key innovation of the organizations is decentralized community-managed livestock health care services backed by integration of capacity building and mainstream linkages, Organisations replicated the idea of Pashu Nurse by training semi-literate rural poor women from high small livestock density villages to provide regular information and first aid services with following distinct qualities
- Doorstep, on-time services
- First aid at the first symptom
- Low-cost services
- Women accessible services
- Integration of knowledge and skills with products & services
- Community Insurance with community-led services
The uniqueness of the approach had been on the following points:-
- Empowering rural poor women to take lead in goat health & productivity enhancement. Demonstration, demystification, and promotion by local livestock rearing women. And command the community to select and own service providers.
- Decentralization of animal management knowledge and services.
- Community insurance to make the system responsible and effective.
- Development of participatory training tools and processes to build local capacity. Linkages with the mainstream on business terms.
- Modifying livestock management approach from delivery to demand-based. Creating village-level learning and discussion platform by Bakari Paalak Pathshaala facilitation.
- Sustaining Pashu Sakhi on input and small business rather than only treatment.
