REPORT Snail IT: Empowering Farmers with Sustainable Livelihoods through Snail Farming A Farmer-Training Initiative of JSS Academy of Higher Education & Research, Mysuru, and Its Alignment with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals 1. Event Overview On 11 August 2026, the School of Life Sciences at JSS Academy of Higher Education & Research (JSS AHER), Mysuru, will host “Snail IT — Training, Knowledge, Opportunity,” a one-day outreach programme themed “Empowering Farmers with Sustainable Livelihoods through Snail Farming.” The event will be held at the JSS AHER campus, Bannimantap, Mysuru, from 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., under the divine blessings of H.H. Jagadguru Sri Shivarathri Deshikendra Mahaswamiji of the Jagadguru Sri Veerasimhasan Mahasamsthana Math, Suttur Srikshetra. The programme is organised in collaboration with the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) through JSS Krishi Vigyan Kendra (KVK), Suttur, and Snail It, a heliciculture initiative powered by Auric Cosmo. Dr. B.N. Gnanesh, Head and Senior Scientist, ICAR–JSS KVK, Suttur, will attend as Chief Guest; Dr. K.A. Raveesha, Dean, School of Life Sciences, as Guest of Honour; and Dr. B. Manjunatha, Registrar, JSS AHER, will preside. Dr. Asha Srinivasan and Mr. Vikram Singh S, both of Auric Cosmo India Private Limited (Snail It), serve as Organising Secretaries. The day's programme highlights span six modules: scientific farming techniques, hatchery and breeding management, feeding and health management, low-cost infrastructure and housing models, processing and value addition, and market opportunities and support — together forming a complete pipeline that carries a participant from basic training through to a saleable product and a market. This structure is captured in the programme's own tagline: “Join Us, Learn & Earn.” 2. Snail Farming as an Emerging Rural Livelihood Heliciculture — the rearing of edible land snails for meat, mucin (“snail slime”), and related value-added products — is drawing growing interest in India as a low-investment, low-land, and low-water diversification option for smallholder and marginal farmers. Snails are herbivorous, require only modest, humid, shaded enclosures, and can be fed largely on vegetable and farm waste, which keeps input costs and resource demands far lower than those of conventional livestock. Their outputs feed two distinct value chains: a protein-rich food product, and mucin and extracts increasingly used in cosmeceuticals and skincare formulations — the latter reflected in the involvement of Auric Cosmo. Because the enterprise needs comparatively little land, capital, or physical strength to operate, it is well suited to marginal farmers, women, and young rural entrepreneurs seeking a supplementary or primary source of income, which is precisely the audience the programme's six modules — from breeding through to market linkage — are designed to equip. 3. Alignment with the UN Sustainable Development Goals Read against the 2030 Agenda, Snail IT is not a narrow technical workshop but a multi-goal intervention. The programme's design — training smallholders in a low-cost, low-resource enterprise and then connecting them to processing and markets — speaks directly to several Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): SDG 1 — No Poverty: By equipping farmers with a new, low-cost enterprise and a route to market, the programme creates an additional or alternative income stream for rural and marginal households, directly supporting efforts to reduce rural poverty. SDG 2 — Zero Hunger: Snail meat is a protein-dense food source, and heliciculture diversifies farm-level food and income production, contributing to household nutrition security and more resilient, diversified farming systems. SDG 3 — Good Health and Well-being: The value-addition component, including snail-derived mucin used in cosmeceutical and wellness products, links the programme to health- and wellness-oriented product development — an emphasis that mirrors JSS AHER's own recognition on SDG-3 impact rankings. SDG 4 — Quality Education: The event is explicitly structured as skills training — “Training · Knowledge · Opportunity” — giving farmers practical, hands-on technical and vocational education in breeding, feeding, infrastructure, and processing. SDG 5 — Gender Equality: Because snail farming demands little physical strength or land ownership, it lowers the entry barriers that often exclude women from agricultural enterprise, opening a viable income-generating activity to women farmers and entrepreneurs. SDG 8 — Decent Work and Economic Growth: The “market opportunities and support” module aims to connect trained farmers to buyers and value chains, fostering micro-enterprise development and decent, self-directed rural employment. SDG 9 — Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure: Training in “low-cost infrastructure models” and “processing and value addition” introduces small-scale innovation and appropriate infrastructure suited to resource-constrained rural settings. SDG 12 — Responsible Consumption and Production: Snail farming's reliance on vegetable and farm waste as feed, combined with its minimal land and water footprint compared to conventional livestock, exemplifies more resource-efficient and sustainable production. SDG 13 — Climate Action: As a low-input, low-emission form of animal protein production relative to conventional livestock rearing, heliciculture offers a climate-smart alternative within diversified farming systems. SDG 15 — Life on Land: Promoting heliciculture as a managed, low-impact land-based enterprise supports sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems and reduces pressure on land compared to more extensive forms of livestock farming. SDG 17 — Partnerships for the Goals: The programme itself is a partnership model in action, bringing together a university (JSS AHER), a national public research body (ICAR, through JSS KVK Suttur), and a private enterprise (Snail It / Auric Cosmo) — exactly the cross-sector collaboration the SDG framework calls for.