Building Back Better: Inclusive Livestock Programs for India’s Migrant Workers

Migration has been a defining feature of India’s labor landscape, with millions of workers—seasonal, circular or distress-driven—moving across regions in search of their livelihoods. The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the extreme vulnerabilities of these migrant populations, especially those dependent on informal or land-linked livelihoods such as small livestock farming. As India focuses on recovery and rural resilience, integrating migrants into inclusive livestock programs is not just a welfare imperative—it is an economic necessity.

The Overlooked Livestock Keepers: Many migrant families in rural and peri-urban India rely on backyard goats, poultry or sheep as supplementary income sources. These small ruminants are often critical to survive especially for landless or asset-constraint groups. However, due to their transient status, migrant workers face major challenges:

• Ineligibility for government livestock schemes tied to local documentation (ration card, Aadhaar seeding, etc.)

• Lack of veterinary access and fodder availability due to frequent mobility

• Insecurity of shelter or land making animal housing or long-term herd care difficult

• Exclusion from insurance, credit and marketing linkages, which require stable identification and location

Towards Inclusive Livestock Development: To “build back better,” livestock-based livelihood programs must be migrant-aware and flexibly designed. Some actionable strategies include:

• Portable Entitlements: Like portable ration cards, livestock services—vaccination, insurance and inputs—should follow the migrant, not the location. Digital livestock IDs linked to Aadhaar or mobile numbers can enable service continuity across states.

• Community-based Models: Deploying Pashu Sakhis (women para-vets) and livestock cadre networks can ensure support reaches migrant households, even in temporary settlements. These grassroots cadres can act as mobile extension agents.

• Mobile Livestock Health Units: Districts with high seasonal migration can operate mobile vet units with multilingual support. Periodic animal health camps near migrant hotspots (brick kilns, construction hubs) are critical.

• Urban-Periurban Linkages: In many cases, migrants rear goats or poultry in slums or outskirts of urban areas. Urban livestock policies must recognize and regulate this, rather than penalize or ignore such efforts.

• Livestock Insurance & Credit Inclusion: Simplified claim procedures and bundled livestock-credit products tailored for migrants—without heavy paperwork—can reduce vulnerability. Community-level risk pooling is another tool.

Policy Recognition is Key: For any of this to work, policy must formally recognize migrant smallholder livestock keepers as a distinct beneficiary group. This includes:

• Including migration indicators in livestock census and livelihood surveys

• Allowing temporary or shared address proofs in livestock-related schemes

• Collaborating with labor departments, urban local bodies and CSR programs

Livestock rearing has long been a resilient fallback for India’s poorest farmers. For migrant workers, this resilience is threatened by systemic exclusion. A renewed focus on inclusivity, portability and field-based innovation in livestock programming can bridge this gap.

If India is to truly “build back better,” then its livestock development agenda must walk with its migrants—step by step, goat by goat for migrants financial sustenance.

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