New Delhi, Jan. 31 -- The Economic Survey 2025 on Friday highlighted and praised Kerala's poverty eradication scheme in which groups of women from low-income families lease land to collectively grow a variety of horticulture crops.

"The state government of Kerala has created an innovative arrangement for land leasing," the Economic Survey 2024-25 said, referring to Kudumbashree launched in 1997. "The initiative has also improved land access for the poor, as more than 85% of the members are under the low-income category."

The word Kudumbashree means family prosperity in Malayalam.

Under this model, self-help groups (SHGs) lease land for more than three years. The local gram panchayat becomes a party to this transaction in which a formal...