Jay Birsa Tribal Farmer Producer Company Limited

If you head out to Lendezari in Tah Tumsar, you’ll find us at house number 125. That is Sanjay Sukhdev Gajah’s place. Jay Birsa Tribal Farmer Producer Company Limited was started to bring the local tribal farmers together. We live in a beautiful part of the country, but getting our products to the market has always been a real struggle for us. We deal with things like forest produce and the small crops we grow on our patches of land. Sanjay is usually around the village if someone needs to talk about the company business. We don't have a big fancy office with computers and all that. Most of our records are kept in books by hand. It’s a bit old-fashioned, but it works for us. The community here is close-knit, so everyone knows what’s going on without needing a lot of announcements. We started this because we wanted to have more control over our own work. It’s hard to compete with the big guys, but together we have a better chance. We spend our days checking on the plants and making sure the harvest is handled correctly. Sometimes the roads are bad and we can't get out for a few days, but we are used to that. We just take things as they come and try to make a living for our families. It is a quiet kind of work, but it matters to everyone here in Lendezari.