BAIF Development Research Foundation (formerly registered as the Bharatiya Agro Industries Foundation), is a reputed voluntary organisation established in 1967 by Dr. Manibhai Desai, a disciple of Mahatma Gandhi, at Urulikanchan, near Pune to promote sustainable livelihood in Rural India.

BAIF is committed to provide sustainable livelihood to the rural poor through climate-resilient agriculture, management of natural resources, livestock development, watershed development and agri-horti-forestry as major income generation activities. BAIF has evolved innovative models of micro-enterprises to ensure inclusive development through dairy husbandry, goat production, agri-horti-forestry and sustainable agricultural production for food security and poverty alleviation. Formation of Producers' Groups, Empowerment of women and environmental sustainability cut across all these programmes.

BAIF has developed the Village Cluster Development Approach to reach the poorest of the poor. This facilitates identifying the problems and needs of poor families and introduction of appropriate technologies and services to solve them. To facilitate backward and forward development and to ensure sustainability, self help groups of men and women of homogeneous socio-economic status are being promoted. These groups have identified various on-farm and non-farm income generation activities to boost their income further.

With a flexible and innovative approach to address individual needs of families, BAIF is now able to provide services to over 5.0 million small and marginal landless families spread over one lakh villages in backward regions of 16 states in the country. Apart from 4500 staff engaged by BAIF, there are thousands of field volunteers and para-veterinarians who are engaged in mentoring the needy beneficiaries at the grassroot level. The participating families are able to make best use of the available resources and to generate additional income to ensure their food security. The increased value of the produce generated through BAIF's programme has been contributing over 5000 crores of rupees to the national GDP every year. Most of these programmes are serving as result demonstrations for wider replication across the country.