Sugarcane cultivation is one of the biggest employment generators for India with 50 million farmers involved in producing around 26 million MT of Sugar making it one of the largest sugar-producing countries in the world. In addition to farmers, 0.5 million workers are directly employed as agricultural labour involved in Sugarcane cultivation and harvesting.

Tamil Nadu is the third largest sugar-producing state in India.
The well-known South Indian company E.I.D. Parry, which now participates in the Better Sugar Initiative (BSI) as its steering group member, seeks to take forward its ethical leadership in the sugar industry by providing support to the sugarcane farmers, enabling them to implement BSI standards and eventually get certified under those standards. Parry is keen to join hands with Solidaridad, South and South East Asia in collaboration with its Indian NGO partner ‘Prakruthi’ to implement this project in the form of running a pilot over a three years period. The project recently launched and started initiated towards the implantation of the project.

Objectives of the project:

• To certify at least 1000 Sugarcane farmers who will supply certified Sugarcane to E.I.D Parry at the end of the project
• To train at least 40,000 smallholder sugarcane farmers and workers in Best Farm Management Practices (BFMP) and in the principles of sustainable chain management.
• To contribute to MDG 1, MDG 7 and MDG 8 targets through the project
• To train one project official in Best Farm Management Practices and sustainable chain management as the lead trainer, and 15 Parry representatives as field trainers.