Agriculture and forestry are the life support system for tribals. The tribal men and women were involved in agriculture since the inception of tribal civilisation. Our study included 4 revenue blocks, namely Koraput, Jeypore, Kundra and Boipariguda of the Koraput district of Odisha. About 120 stakeholders of farming families were interviewed by the use of PRA tools with a pre-structured questionnaire. Rice, Finger millet and Maize were found to be the commonly cultivated cereals giving food, nutrition and livelihood support to them. In this agricultural system women farmers play a vital role in preparation of organic formulation, as they are found to be the main stakeholders in the entire agricultural operations. Basically, traditional farming practices followed by them meant a low-level sustainable production for year-round con-sumption only. But, tribal farming communities in the age range of 20-35 were found to adopt the introduction of high-yielding and resistant varieties, which is contributing towards the enhancement of production as well as economic benefits. Production of local and resistant high-yielding varieties was compared with the use of both traditional and modern sustainable practices. But, due to poor infrastructure, economic instability, and lack of knowledge in commer-cial-scale cultivation, the production enhancement is not in par with the desired production in many cases. Govt. and private sector participation can improve modern technical know-how to combine the traditional agricultural practice with improved agroeconomic practices to enhance sustainable cereal production for livelihood, socio-economic development and vulnerable tribal resource-poor tribal community self-sustainability in an era of climate change and modern agri-culture system.

Women Empowerment, Sustainable Cereal Production, Tribal Dominated Stakeholders, Koraput District