India, Nov. 3 -- When the pandemic disrupted markets in 2020, Poona Yadav of Barkheda village in Madhya Pradesh's Mandla district faced a dilemma. The 42-year-old, like most households in her village, had come to depend entirely on the market for vegetables and greens. But with prices soaring and access shrinking during lockdowns, she turned towards a source long forgotten: the forest.

"Until 2020, I spent about '500 every week on vegetables," she says. "When the markets closed and prices soared, I returned to the forest to forage for fruits and vegetables. Now I spend only Rs 50-100 a week on vegetables and that too only when the forest does not have enough." She adds that "the food is more nourishing than what I used to buy".

Yadav's ...