04/06/2026
From Farm Waste to Climate Leadership: Women of Jalna Build a Green Rural Economy
In the villages of Jalna district in the heart of Marathwada, the soyabean harvest has long left behind a difficult reality tonne of agricultural residue scattered across fields, often burned in the open due to lack of alternatives. The smoke rising from these fields became a familiar symbol of both rural hardship and climate stress in a region already grappling with erratic rainfall, drought cycles, and declining environmental resilience.
They are thinking differently?
Led by the self help group of Zashichirani Community Managed Resource Centre (CMRC), agricultural waste is being transformed into an engine of climate action, clean energy, and rural livelihood generation. What was once discarded as waste has now become the foundation of a women-led green enterprise producing biomass briquettes compressed fuel blocks made from soyabean residue.While briquette technology itself is not new, the model emerging in Jalna is unique because it places rural women at the centre of the climate economy.
The women’s Self-Help Groups (SHGs) associated with Zashichirani CMRC have built an ecosystem where women manage every stage of the value chain from collection and processing of crop residue to production, transportation, marketing, and household usage. The initiative has created not only cleaner fuel alternatives but also sustainable income opportunities and community ownership.
Climate Leadership Rooted in Everyday Rural Life
Across Marathwada, climate adaptation is often discussed in terms of large infrastructure or policy interventions. But in Jalna, women are demonstrating that climate leadership can begin at the household and village level.
By converting agricultural residue into cleaner-burning briquettes, the women are reducing open-field burning — one of the major contributors to air pollution and carbon emissions in rural areas. The initiative also reduces dependence on firewood and inefficient traditional fuels, helping households shift toward more sustainable energy practices.
The environmental impact is significant. Less crop burning means reduced smoke pollution, improved local air quality, and better utilisation of biomass waste that would otherwise contribute to environmental degradation.
More importantly, the initiative reflects how rural women are becoming frontline climate leaders designing local solutions to global environmental challenges.
Building a Rural Green Economy
The economic impact of the initiative is equally transformative.
Soyabean cultivation dominates the agricultural landscape of Jalna and neighbouring districts, generating large quantities of residue every season. Through organised collection and briquette production, the women-led enterprise now produces nearly 25 tonnes of briquettes every month.
Sold at approximately ₹9,000 per tonne, with an estimated profit margin of ₹2,000 per tonne, the enterprise has created a steady stream of income for women involved in the activity. Unlike conventional business models where profits remain concentrated among a few actors, the briquette initiative distributes earnings across the community.Women earn through production work, transportation, packaging, and local sales, ensuring that climate action directly translates into household-level economic empowerment.
The initiative is also helping redefine rural entrepreneurship. Instead of migration-driven survival economies, women are creating locally rooted green enterprises that generate employment while strengthening climate resilience.
Women Driving the Climate TransitionWhat makes the Zashichirani CMRC model particularly powerful is that it combines environmental sustainability with social transformation.
The women are not only producing fuel they are reshaping local perceptions around waste, energy, and leadership. In villages where women’s work often remained invisible, they are now emerging as entrepreneurs, innovators, and climate champions.
At a time when conversations around climate change often focus on technology and global targets, the women of Jalna offer a grounded reminder: some of the most effective climate solutions are already being built in rural communities led by women turning local challenges into opportunities for resilience and change.
From agricultural waste to green enterprise, the briquette initiative stands as a powerful example of how climate action, when rooted in community leadership, can create cleaner environments, stronger local economies, and dignified livelihoods for rural women.
