Madhya Pradesh: Sidhi Restoration Covers 13 Villages; WRI Reports 2,171 Hectares Restored

Rural Development Today | 14 October 2026 | Madhya Pradesh | Watersheds, Rural Livelihoods, Panchayati Raj and SDG 6, 8 and 15

WRI India published a 58-page practice note on 13 October 2026 documenting landscape-restoration work carried out from March 2021 to March 2025 in 13 villages of Sidhi district, Madhya Pradesh. The selected pilot landscape covered about 9,043 hectares, including approximately 6,357 hectares of revenue land and 2,685 hectares of forest land.

WRI India’s 2026 institutional reporting records 2,171 hectares of land restored and soil and water conservation work across 866.6 hectares. The organisation also reported mobilising more than 500 farmers into a producer organisation with annual turnover exceeding ₹10 lakh. These are WRI-reported programme figures, not independent measurements of changes in every participating household’s income.

The initiative involved WRI India, Sidhi district administration, Madhya Pradesh’s Department of Panchayat and Rural Development and local implementation partner Action for Social Advancement, supported through HSBC’s Climate Solutions Partnership. Work included watershed structures, soil and moisture conservation, agroforestry, nutrition gardens and restoration-linked mahua, bamboo and jackfruit value chains. Support for women-led producer groups included processing mahua into value-added foods.

The project included training for representatives of Panchayati Raj institutions, self-help groups, water-user groups and government departments. A citizen-science application collected geolocation information and geotagged photographs for field monitoring. The 13-village pilot is distinct from WRI India’s earlier district-wide assessment identifying more than 300,000 hectares of potential restoration land in Sidhi.

Original research (13 October 2026): https://wri-india.org/research/pilot-scale-lessons-community-led-landscape-restoration-sidhi-madhya-pradesh

Project description and partners: https://wri-india.org/initiatives/landscape-restoration-sidhi

WRI India Annual Report 2026 (institutional results): https://wri-india.org/sites/default/files/2026-06/WRI%20India%20Annual%20Report%202026.pdf