Ochü Millet Festival opened with bright stalls, warm songs, and a clear purpose, revive a beloved harvest ritual while pushing millet back into daily diets and village incomes at Zakie Ground on August 30.
Organised by the Kezoma Village Council with the Departments of Agriculture and Tourism, the event blended local energy with state partnership to boost crop revival and cultural continuity.
Special guest Y. Vikheho Swu, President of the NDPP Agri and Allied Organisation and Managing Director of Okusa Toyota, addressed the gathering, reflecting growing institutional interest in the millet movement.
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An exhibition cum sale featured millets harvested in July alongside organic vegetables and fruits from Kezoma, turning the ground into a direct market for farmers and home producers. ATMA under the Agriculture Department displayed millet based products, pointing to value addition and small enterprise possibilities around traditional grains.
Speakers spotlighted foxtail millet’s everyday benefits for heart health, weight management, digestion, and bone strength, framing it as a nutritious staple rather than a niche grain. The message tied nutrition to livelihoods, encouraging households to scale up cultivation with support from local institutions.
Chünyi: harvest, rain and memory
Millet is among Kezoma’s earliest harvests, marked by Chünyi, a two day observance, Kide, Kizie, for rituals and Kreuo zha for rest and celebration, remembered for its prayers for rain that begin paddy cultivation. In earlier times, neighbouring villages even asked Kezoma to hold Chünyi for rainfall, revealing the observance’s agricultural pull across the region.
Households once slaughtered a dog or piglet during Chünyi to regain strength after harvest, while those rites have ceased, the observance lives on to preserve heritage for younger generations. This year’s programme echoed that continuity, as leaders of Kezoma, Kezo Basa, and Kezo Town set an annual date for Chünyi and earmarked plots to expand millet farming.
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Scaling up cultivation and livelihoods
Urging expansion of millet cultivation for durable gains, Swu also conveyed appreciation from Agriculture Adviser Mhathung Yanthan for Kezoma’s leadership, linking pride in tradition with future ready farming. He advised balancing modern agriculture with jhum, not abandoning traditional systems but blending methods suited to current conditions.
Recent steps back this shift, under the National Food Security Mission, demonstrations had over 100 farmers sow three millet varieties across a two hectare plot at Chieza with district support.
Plans for millet mills aim to cut drudgery and enable market ready products, while local messaging reframes millet from a stigmatised grain to a health forward choice, together, the Ochü Millet Festival joined culture, nutrition, and enterprise into visible momentum.
