A training programme on 'Management of backyard poultry' was organized under the collaborative project on "Empowerment of farm women through livestock technologies" at ICAR-CIWA on 22 March 2016. Thirty five farmers including 28 women from two villages Alapur (Gop block, puri district) and Chamrapada (Barang block, cuttack district) participated in the training programme. Under the project, Vanraja variety of backyard poultry have been distributed among the farm women in the two adopted villages. In the training programme, the farm women were explained the importance of backyard poultry for self employment, making low cost poultry feed for improved productivity, health management and vaccination schedule of poultry birds, importance of backyard poultry on household nutrition, government policies and programmes in poultry sector, etc. The farm women were also given hands on training on preparation of balanced feed for poultry. They also shared their experiences and informed about the ITKs in the management of poultry diseases. The meeting also provided a platform for cross learning among the farmers of the two districts wherein the farmers from Alapur gave their strong points in management of backyard poultry and those from Chamrapada in managing the dairy animals. The success story of MAPEM project was also shared during the meeting. The farmers also visited the experimental farm of the Institute and were delighted to see the different fodder varieties in the fodder demonstration unit. The training programme was attended by Dr Anil Kumar, PI of the project and Dr B. Sahoo, Dr Tanuja, S., Dr Ananta Sarkar, Dr S.D. Argade, Dr S.K. Nayak, and Sh. B. Behera.