Rishi Kesh Tiwari

Rishi Kesh is combating the devastating poverty of rural areas by opening up new opportunities for the rural population and training “agricultural entrepreneurs.” By teaching rural populations new ways of utilizing their land and available natural resources, he is breaking the mold of deeply-entrenched and antiquated agricultural practices that contribute to larger problems of massive emigration and atrophying education.

Rishi Kesh is developing rural communities in Nepal by providing training and new job opportunities for all community members, from landowners to landless “untouchables.” He is assisting the former to get higher returns, and helping the latter find new jobs—a process which is boosting the village economy and decreasing emigration to urban areas.
Rishi Kesh realized that to break the vicious cycle of rural unemployment, poverty, and emigration, agricultural workers needed to become more productive through innovative, sustainable farming methods. By organizing self-help training groups, Rishi Kesh trains agricultural workers so they can develop the skills and confidence to make the best of their agro-forestry resources and ultimately improve their livelihoods.
Recognizing that the Nepalese government’s efforts to build agricultural infrastructure were falling short, Rishi Kesh began working closely with farmers and landowners to identify the best methods being used as well as to develop new ones. Then, he organized community groups to spread alternative agro-forestry practices and provide technical support to landlords and landless untouchables alike. Whether by teaching how to develop organic manure and pesticides out of often discarded “waste” or by providing marketing consulting to the agro-forestry industry, Rishi Kesh is creating new wealth and new opportunities in rural Nepal.
This rising class of “agricultural entrepreneurs” has learned how to create wealth through proper management and use of agricultural products and Non Timber Forest Products (NTFP products). Already, the attitudes of rural farmers are changing from one of desperation and survival to one of opportunity and potential. Productivity and yield have increased, to the point where household-based enterprises are sprouting. For Rishi Kesh, this is a powerful development for alleviating rural poverty more broadly.

Nepal is a largely agricultural society, with more than 80 percent of households living in rural areas and dependent on agriculture as their form of livelihood. The majority of these households, however, live on subsistence agriculture and know little about alternate or cash crops. They work with arable land less than 0.5 hectares per lot and often report that their production is barely sufficient to feed the household. Most have never imagined the potential and demand for agricultural produce in the urban markets.
Lack of access to technology and agricultural best practices leaves rural Nepal with limited opportunities and few avenues for rural development. As infrastructural development in the form of roads and irrigation reaches the rural hills of Nepal, many of these areas actually become poorer. Whatever economy or capital did exist often becomes diluted by purchases from urban centers. In the absence of local sustainable economic activities, there is little capital flowing into the rural hills. Such one-way flow of capital (and of migrants) removes whatever scarce capital is present and forces those who remain to struggle with their scarce resources. This lack of wealth contributes to the cycle of emigration, as well as worsening education and health.
The problem is not a lack of natural resources, but a lack of education and agricultural expertise to best take advantage of those resources. With no sophisticated or structured agricultural markets, Nepalese landowners and landless farmers alike will have difficulty generating surpluses and the wealth necessary to establish household enterprises and commercial agriculture. The current conflict-ridden political situation only worsens matters, leaving little hope of external investment and ventures at the local level.

Rishi Kesh Tiwari realized that to bring about lasting change and development in the rural hills of Nepal, agriculture would have to be commercialized at the local level. In 1994, he established the Parbat Community Development Society (PCDS) named after Parbat, his home district, a typical hilly district of Nepal which lacks urban centers and mainstream economic activity. His goal was to tackle the biggest hurdle in rural Nepal: lack of education and agricultural expertise among the villagers. His strategy is simple: practical demonstration.
Rishi Kesh is organizing self-help groups to impart education and knowledge to the people. In an interactive manner, he works closely with these community groups to identify solutions for villages, provide support and technical services in agriculture to the villagers, and create infrastructure undertakings such as small-irrigation projects, foot trails and construction of public toilets. These immediately noticeable activities have made it easier for him to gain the confidence and trust of the villagers.
Rishi Kesh is utilizing this trust, along with demonstrated success with small development projects, to push rural populations further in their thinking about agricultural commerce. He is building mutually re-enforcing agricultural practices in rural areas, where the landless and untouchables are given priority in training. He has created opportunities to hook the jobless into the system. There is no cost involved since they bring back the product of the forest while grazing their animals and with the technique of PCDS, make manure, fertilizers and pesticides. These products are marketed by PCDS, which has given them enough income to look after their homes and educate their children. In this way, he is giving the jobless an important role in the economic circle.
As a result of this work, new breeds of “agriculture entrepreneurs” operating out of their households are working to create numerous new employment opportunities and related economic activities. Around 90 percent of the households in the villages that he has adopted now plant cash crops. One example is Cherospondias axillaries, locally known as “Lapsi” which grows in abundance in Nepal and can be processed to produce candy, pickles, and other edible items at the household level to generate a big leap in income for the villagers. Along with the household-based food-processing enterprises, Rishi Kesh has also utilized natural herbs and plants, generally categorized as “nature’s waste,” to produce organic manures and pesticides. This created a wave of small agro-forestry ventures that are commercially viable and provide local employment. His initiative has added a new form of small agriculture-based enterprise that now supplies the processed products to urban centers.
Rishi Kesh also founded an outlet shop where he markets the produce of the villagers and various cooperatives, and barters them for necessary essentials like tea, toothbrushes, toothpaste and soap. These necessities enter the village while the village produce is exported, creating a trade balance as well as a healthy demand for agricultural products from those living in urban areas.
Rishi Kesh is enabling these new “agriculture entrepreneurs” to get the start-up capital required by establishing a community saving and credit cooperative in the Parbat district. He has reached out to five villages, or about 4,000 households, and plans to expand over the next year. His farmer-to-farmer diffusion program has already benefited 40 other villages, since farmers that have been trained by him are highlighted as the “lead farmers” and asked to visit and train others. Site visits by other farmers from various districts enable the best agricultural practices to spread and contribute to a self-multiplying group of agricultural specialists.
Rishi Kesh is planning to open a community learning center with modern technologies that will generate revenue and create new opportunities for the villagers for education and employment. The revenue generated will then help him establish a community information center so that it can be a referral point for other agricultural entrepreneurs in other districts of Nepal and be a source of continued learning, sharing and activity.
Already, Rishi Kesh’s efforts have generated new employment and new roles for rural Nepalese of all classes. Agricultural surplus and access to markets have had ancillary benefits including the ability to send children to school and improvements in health and sanitation. Rural farmers are more eager to learn, are taking initiative, and seem more optimistic about their future.

Rishi Kesh’s father was a well-to-do man who had collected wealth from his land and money-lending business, but Rishi Kesh wasn’t in tune with his father from a young age. Rishi Kesh disliked the limitations of the caste system and went against the wishes of his family by befriending the poor and untouchables. Every time he saw that his value system didn’t align with the norm, he took a different turn. Once he was disciplined by his father for giving his extra pair of shoes to an untouchable boy in his village who had none. He was taken to Kathmandu in the sixth grade because there were no good schools in his village.
A student leader in college, he was imprisoned while fighting to bring democracy to Nepal. Despite getting an excellent education in the capital and a good job as the principal of a school, he decided to go back to his village to pursue his vision to work for the poor. His friendship with people across all castes, creeds and educational backgrounds made him an immediate choice for taking up a leadership role in his village. He was elected the Village Development Committee Chairman in 1993, but soon realized that much could be achieved by working outside the government and its bureaucratic structure. He set up the Parbat Community Development Society which is committed to making agriculture a viable business for rural people. Ultimately, Rishi Kesh is dedicated to improving the lives of rural people through agriculture.