As part of the IRRI-CIWA Collaborative Project on 'Increased Productivity of Rice based Cropping Systems and Farmers Income in Odisha', a training course on ''LEAP - Leadership and Entrepreneurship Program for Women in Agriculture'' was organized at ICAR-CIWA, Bhubaneswar during 30 October-3 November, 2017. The goal of the course was to develop leadership and entrepreneurship skills of women, who are middle-level cadres in Non Governmental Organizations (NGOs).

The programme would train women to be leaders and facilitators of entrepreneurship development, in a workshop format of 5 days duration. This would be followed by coaching and mentoring as they support enterprise development by rural women including youth. Twenty one middle level cadres from different NGOs in Odisha participated in the course. Dr. Jatinder Kishtwaria from ICAR-CIWA, Dr. Ranjitha Puskur, Dr. Poonima Shankar and Dr. M. Myriam from IRRI, and Dr. C.R. Pattanayak from Entrepreneurship Development Institute imparted training. The expected outputs of the course was that, at the end of the programme, the participants would have an invaluable sense of their own potential as leaders and change-makers in society. They would also be able to support development of viable businesses by women farmers.