Monaragala is a land locked district in Sri Lanka. This agriculture-based district is one of the poorest in the country with more than 37% of the population living below the poverty line, compared to national figure of 15%.The Capacity Development for Decentralized Poverty Reduction Project (CD-DPR) was implemented by the Ministry of Agricultural Development and Agrarian Services with financial support from UNDP to develop capacities of the community to actively participate in poverty reduction programs in the province.

Lime, like many other agricultural crops, is a seasonal crop and harvested only from November to March. Limes are abundant in this area, but are hardly harvested due to marketing problems. It was revealed that the price of one kilogram of lime during lime season was as low as 3 Rupee (roughly US 3 cents). The price was not even enough to meet the transport cost and as a result people never bothered to collect the limes.

Recently, a private sector entrepreneur began collecting the limes and smoking them which could then be exported to Middle Eastern countries where there is high demand. However, the entrepreneur was not able to get all the necessary requirements together to expand the venture on his own. Hence a partnership was required. We contacted the entrepreneur and found there were a number of things to do in order to get the project off the ground: sufficient quantities of limes, smoking facilities (ovens), a cheap energy source, quality control, and up-front purchasing contracts.

UNDP already had a number of social mobilizers in place who were engaged in empowerment and civil society strengthening processes with goals to form homogeneous producer societies to transfer technology, micro credit, marketing linkages to increase the agricultural income. As a pilot project, the new partners formed a lime producer society comprised of 60 farmers. Then the CD-DPR provided a grant of USD1500 to build three units in three locations and 18 ovens out of brick and mortar. The entrepreneur supervised the construction of the ovens and trained them on the technology.

A private company has signed a forward sales agreement with the society to buy unlimited quantities of smoked lime. The raw lime which was going waste is now bought by the society at 8 Rupee (about US 7 cents) per kilogram, and then processed and sold to the private company at a rate of 80 Rupee per kilogram. The profits are then deposited in an account maintained by the society.

As there are three paddy mills in the area, paddy husks, which used to be burned away, is widely available as the energy source. One bag of paddy husk is bought at a price of 8 Rupee per bag by the society. Lime and paddy husk collection has now become a good source of income not only for poor families but also a good source of earning pocket money for many school children in the area.  

For more information, please contact Dr. Fredrick Abeyratne, Senior Programme Analyst, UNDP Sri Lanka