Sustainable Agricultural Livelihoods in Tribal Odisha: An Analysis of Indigenous Farming Systems, Market Access, and Socio-Economic Challenges

Because tribal agriculture in Odisha is located at the intersection of rainfed farming, forest dependence, smallholder risk and policy experimentation including in millets, women’s collectives, farmer producer organisations, forest rights, and decentralized procurement. This article examines the sustainability of livelihoods in tribal communities resulting from indigenous farming systems, which is related to market-access and socio-economic constraints affecting livelihood security. The analysis uses secondary data and considers government statistics, peer-reviewed literature, institutional reports, and policy documents using the Sustainable Livelihoods Framework and theories around agroecology, indigenous knowledge systems, and market access. The evidence demonstrates that mixed cropping, millet-pulse systems, low-external-input maintenance of landrace seeds, pest and soil management, livestock integration, forest-food systems, among others, enhance natural and social capital, facilitate dietary diversification of house barn, and build ecological resilience at rainfed and upland areas. Despite this potential, a number of factors limit their livelihoods, including: small and fragmented holdings, uncertainty in rainfall, land and forest tenure insecurity, limited irrigation, weak rural roads, inadequate storage and processing, dependence on intermediaries, poor access to institutional credit, gendered drudgery, and inadequate access to extension services. The Odisha Millets Mission/Shree Anna Abhiyan, Agriculture Production Cluster model, self-help groups, tribal livelihood programmes and other recent interventions have facilitated better coordination, aggregation and price discovery in selected locations. However, impact of these interventions is contingent upon last mile infrastructure, procurement timing, working capital, participatory extension and culturally compatible technology. Sustainable tribal agriculture will require more than the promotion of crops. It will require rights-based governance of resources, resilient markets, women-centred skill-saving innovations, community seed systems, climate adaptation, and institutional convergence. The framework of integrated livelihood-market for tribal agrarian development in Odisha has been contributed through the study along with highlighting priorities for future field-based and longitudinal research.