Indigenous Brinjal variety gobindpali Brinjal: A ray of hope for the tribal farmers of Malkangiri district -A case study

Although a lot of this perception may be based on a lack of evidence, indigenous vegetables (IVs) are thought to be underutilised crops. This paper provides an overview on the scope and value of indigenous vegetable consumption in Odisha. Based on household data, farmer comments, PRA output, and field survey results from the Khairiput block of the Malkangiri district, this article emphasised the critical reason for conservation and popularization of the indigenous vegetable Gobindpali brinjal as it helps the tribal farmers to support their livelihood and earns them higher income. The study demonstrates that Indigenous brinjal cultivar ‘Gobindpali brinjal’ not only plays a significant role in ensuring food security for poor households, but also constitute an increasingly appealing food group for upper income groups by linking consumption data with food market and consumer preference data. Based on household data and farmers feedback and output of PRA and field survey work from the Khairiput block of Malkangiri distinct this paper highlights the role that Indigenous vegetable, Gobindpali brinjal plays an important role for farmers income and support their livelihood. By linking consumption data with food market and consumers preference data, the study shows that Indigenous Gobindpali brinjal cultivar not only plays an important role in providing food security for poor households, but also constitute an increasingly attractive food group for upper income groups. In conclusion, this study concluded that indigenous vegetables are not underutilized, but undervalued. By preserving biodiversity and indigenous knowledge on production and consumption of this Indigenous vegetable, and by providing improved package and practices scientists can contribute to the well-being of thousands of poor tribal farmers by enabling them to participate in growing markets for this crop. Also it was concluded that there is a greater scope of crop improvement through selection of this brinjal variety from this particular geographical growing tract and it should be taken for the Geographical Indications(GI) of goods under (registration and protection) act, 1999.