Agri Tech – Dutch Uncles

UrbanKisaan, Pioneering Hydroponic Space

Anju Nambiar — Wed, 18 Aug 2021 05:35:08 +0000

If you’ve come across UrbanKisaan, they have a beautiful website where you can purchase farm fresh produce, exotic vegetables, unique salad bowls, and hydroponics kits. Besides, their name is self-explanatory. Just by reading the name of their brand, you can understand that the company is into modern farming. These are a few reasons why they have ticked in the Agri-tech market and are currently one of the most popular hydroponic brands in India.

Who is UrbanKisaan?

UrbanKisaan is a Hydroponics start-up based in Hyderabad. It is an Indian early-stage business founded in 2017. The company owns and operates several suburban greenhouses and vertical indoor farms in two major Indian cities, Hyderabad and Bengaluru. They also have an e-commerce store consisting of their UrbanKisaan app and website where they sell fresh produce grown in their franchises. Their e-commerce store also features their specialty hydroponics starter kit to help budding hydroponic farmers grow their first produce.

What is Hydroponics?

Hydroponics is a new-age farming technique that skips the use of soil to grow plants and relies on mineral nutrients to give the growing crops their supply of nutrients. Through this technique, the herb or vegetable seedlings or saplings are planted into an inert growing media like a PVC pipe where they grow only through supply of nutrient rich water. Hydroponics farming is usually carried out indoors like a greenhouse or terrace.

How UrbanKisaan optimised Hydroponics technology in Tropical India

UrbanKisaan’s proprietary Hydroponics technology is more efficient than the conventional global standards in Hydroponics cultivation. Their approach is based on relatively little effort. They rely on Internet-of-Things (IoT) enabled technology for farm monitoring of nutrient content, pH levels, atmospheric humidity, CO2 concentration, light concentration which are controlled and adapted to the needs of the crops using an app. As such, it has created growing demand among customers in tropical climates which are generally not ideal for Hydroponics produce.

India offers limited resources in terms of farming area and freshwater reserves. By reducing water usage by about 90 per cent, UrbanKisaan is optimising Hydroponics for Tropical India by presenting an efficient way to grow crops in densely populated urban areas.

How the company has made Hydroponics cost-effective

UrbanKisaan has a very cost-effective approach to Hydroponics wherein they produce food at only one-tenth of the costs compared to traditional supply chains. Their network of indoor vertical farms in India requires less than 1% land and saves nearly 2,16,000 litres of water per farm per month. Their urban farms span an approximate area of 2000 square feet.

Their supply chain is inside and close to the consumption centres which are primarily urban cities. Thus, they are cutting down on thousands of food miles which makes their business model highly cost effective.

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Farm businesses with compelling business models like UrbanKisaan can see increased sales in India.

What’s in it for me?

Online food retailing is booming in India. There is growing demand among consumers. Businesses in the Hydroponics, Agri-Tech sector are being well received. Farm businesses with compelling business models like UrbanKisaan can see increased sales in India. Innovative agricultural and food-related businesses in Asia are a key focus area for Agri-Tech investors owing to the market opportunity.

India is a large consumer for fruits and vegetables. However, the market share for organised channels like modern trade and online retail is still at 20%. Which means there’s a big chunk of untapped opportunity awaiting start-ups. In the organised fresh produce market in India, Hydroponics is a fast-growing and efficient alternative to traditional supply chains. It is awaiting disruption and innovation by Agri-tech start-ups and small businesses.

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PMFME Scheme Empowering SMEs, Tribal Women And Rural Farmers

DU Desk — Fri, 13 Aug 2021 10:35:08 +0000

The central government has introduced several schemes and initiatives to promote entrepreneurship among tribal and rural farmers in the agriculture industry. These schemes are bringing together self-help groups among farming communities and enabling them to become financially independent and technologically savvy.

What is the PMFME scheme?

The Prime Minister’s Formalisation of Micro Food Enterprises (PMFME) scheme is a central and state government scheme for farmers. Under this scheme, aspiring entrepreneurs in the agriculture sector can avail INR 10 Lakh in funding to start their business. Aimed at doubling the income of farmers, PMFME is implemented under the ‘One District One Product’ program. The scheme became operational in 2021-2021 and will go on until 2024-25, facilitating the setup of 2 lakh micro processing units during the period of 5 years.

Support for micro food enterprises

Credit linked subsidy

Micro food processing enterprises will receive upgrade support by the Government through PMFME scheme. The enterprises will be set up or upgraded through credit linked subsidy. The enterprises will also enjoy financial, technical, and business support. Eligible projects can avail credit-linked capital subsidy at 35% of the project cost with a maximum ceiling of INR 10 Lakh per unit.

Capacity building or training support

Enterprises availing capital investment as well as other existing units will be provided capacity building or training support in the following focus areas

Areas of focus

- - - Entrepreneurship development
    - Marketing
    - Bookkeeping
    - Registration
    - Compliance with FSSAI standards
    - Udyog Aadhar
    - GST Registration
    - General hygiene
    - Other essential functions

Specially designed training

The micro enterprise units will go through specially designed training for focus areas like machine operations, hygiene issues, procurement, packaging, storage, new product development, etc.

Success rate of the PMFME scheme

PMFME is a centrally sponsored scheme under the Aatmanirbhar Bharat initiative by the Ministry of Food Processing Industry (MoFPI). In the span of one year since its launch, PMFME has been implemented in 35 states and Union Territories. Milestones achieved in one year include launch of the GIS (Geographic Information System) digital map for all states and UTs. Agreements and MoUs (Memorandum of Understanding) were signed with 11 banks that are official lending partners of PMFME, and the Union Bank of India which is the Nodal Bank for the scheme. The National Rural Livelihood Mission sanctioned INR 25.25 Cr to 8040 SHG members (Self Help Group) as seed capital. MoUs were signed with NAFED (National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India) and TRIFED (Tribal Cooperative Marketing Federation of India) for Marketing and Branding support.

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The scheme became operational in 2021-2021 and will go on until 2024-25, facilitating the setup of 2 lakh micro processing units during the period of 5 years.The scheme became operational in 2021-2021 and will go on until 2024-25, facilitating the setup of 2 lakh micro processing units during the period of 5 years.

What’s in it for me?

Aspiring agriculture entrepreneurs who can leverage villagers and farmers to create food products will benefit from the scheme. Also, entrepreneurs who can empower tribal farmers by purchasing raw material directly from them and using branding and digital marketing will benefit from the incentives.

PMFME has been very beneficial for self-help groups and groups of farmers. It’s empowering rural and tribal farmers and women to assume leadership roles. By utilising the incentives and benefits from the scheme they can improve the financial conditions and work towards the collective welfare of their communities. But more importantly, co-founders and individual entrepreneurs of agricultural enterprises who are non-farmers can apply for the PMFME scheme and directly empower the underprivileged sections like tribal women and impoverished farmers. Your enterprise can create food products like packaged spices, ethnic coffee, etc. for which you will no doubt be needing expert hands and the experience of these rural farmers.

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Government’s Promising Schemes for Boosting Agriculture Ecosystem

Anju Nambiar — Fri, 30 Jul 2021 12:35:10 +0000

Agriculture is now a market-driven business in India. Agri-businesses in India include food production, farming, farm machinery, seed supply, fertilisers, Agri-chemicals, irrigation equipment, distribution, processing, marketing, trade, wholesaling and retailing. The Government introduces schemes mainly to bolster the agriculture sector of India and to improve the economic condition of stakeholders.

Government schemes supporting the Agriculture ecosystem

Atal Innovation Mission

The Atal Innovation Mission fosters innovation and entrepreneurship within the country and is a flagship initiative by the Government of India. Setup by NITI (National Institution for Transforming India) Ayog, it develops programs and policies for various sectors in the economy. The mission collaborates with private companies to nurture innovation across various sectors like agriculture and healthcare, among others.

NewGen Innovation and Entrepreneurship Development Centres

The NewGen IEDC is a Government Scheme under the Start-up India program which is working to foster an entrepreneurial culture among academic institutions. Under this scheme, students are encouraged to pursue initiatives with commercialisation potential. Sponsored by the National Science & Technology Entrepreneurship Development Board (NSTEDB), its an entrepreneurship development programme for industries like chemicals, networking & telecommunications, Agriculture and Artificial Intelligence, among others.

Venture Capital Assistance promoted by the Small Farmers’ Agri-Business Consortium

The Venture Capital Assistance scheme, as the name suggests, provides financial support in the form of interest free loans for Agri businesses in association with the Small Farmers’ Agri-Business Consortium.

Agriculture Grand Challenges

The Agriculture Grand Challenges are Government initiatives that encourage and identify Agri-innovations by start-ups that address the major problem areas of Indian agriculture.

Initiative for Development for Entrepreneurs in Agriculture (IDEA)

This Government scheme is part of the NEDFL (North-eastern Development Finance Corporation Ltd) schemes by the Ministry of Development of North-eastern Region aimed at promoting and extending assistance to agri-businesses in the north-east region of India.

Agri Udaan

Agri Udaan is an agribusiness accelerator programme by the Government. It’s a platform for scale-up stage food & agribusiness start-ups to acquire mentoring, networking and investor access organised by a-IDEA (Association of Innovation Development of Entrepreneurship in Agriculture) in conjunction with NABARD (National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development).

Innovation and Agri Entrepreneurship Development programme

This scheme was launched under the Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana to support Agri entrepreneurship and Agri businesses by providing financial support for start-ups. It provides employment opportunities to young entrepreneurs thus indirectly working to increase the income of farmers.

How these schemes boost the agricultural ecosystem

These schemes boost the agricultural ecosystem by working to increase agricultural productivity in Indian farming. They directly benefit farmers by prioritising their welfare. It helps agriculture stakeholders to eventually achieve the goal of qualitative improvements in their agricultural yield and products.

How agriculture start-ups will benefit

Agriculture start-ups will benefit by recognition from the Government and growth achieved through support from these schemes. The agriculture start-up ecosystem will also swell as more start-ups emerge to tap into the potential market opportunity with help from the Government. Apart from the recognition, a number of other benefits like tax exemption and patent support will encourage more start-ups to venture into the agri business.

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The NewGen IEDC is a Government Scheme under the Start-up India program which is working to foster an entrepreneurial culture among academic institutions.

What’s in it for me?

Government schemes for boosting the agriculture ecosystem fosters entrepreneurship within the industry. Start-ups can enjoy benefits like capital investment subsidies and avail financing. Start-ups and entrepreneurs in agriculture and allied sectors can scale up with support from the government. By scaling operations through these schemes, agri-businesses would be able to reach farmers across every corner of the country.

The partnership between start-ups and the agriculture community will lead to better outcomes for the industry such as improved decision making and effective management in farming practices. With a continually improving and robust policy framework at the Government level, the Agricultural ecosystem will grow and gain solid footing which will in turn benefit the industry at large.

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Agri-Tech May Benefit with the Recent Fertiliser Subsidy

Anju Nambiar — Thu, 29 Jul 2021 05:35:07 +0000

Fertiliser is one of the prime components of Agriculture or Agri-tech. Without a steady supply of fertiliser, crops won’t grow within the stipulated time and harvest gets impacted. But the global price hike on commonly used fertilisers and their raw materials have forced domestic manufacturers to sell at raised prices. This could have led to a severe farming crisis. With the Government’s timely intervention, farmers will be supported during this price surge so that they can continue acquiring fertilisers at the old rates.

Government increases Fertiliser Subsidy Outlay

The Government has recently allocated an additional amount of INR 14775 Cr as fertiliser subsidy for farmers. A stimulus package of INR 6.29 Lakh Cr was announced which comprises Government guarantee to banks and microfinance institutions for loans.

How Agri-Tech will benefit

The fertiliser subsidy will particularly benefit the Agri-Tech sector by helping farmers. It will ensure that the sale price for farmers remains unchanged with the wavering of international prices on inputs. Also, the stimulus package is mainly aimed at helping Covid hit sectors revive, Agri-tech in particular.

How Farmers from North-Eastern states will benefit

The fertiliser subsidy announcement will also prove to be beneficial for North-Eastern states and farmers in this region. As part of the stimulus package, the Government is also looking to revive the Northeastern Regional Agricultural Marketing Corporation (NERAMAC). This move will help farmers in eight north-eastern states obtain remunerative prices for their agriculture-horticulture produce.

5 ways the updates will impact stakeholders

DAP (Di-Ammonium Phosphate) fertiliser has achieved a subsidy hike of 137%. This will balance out the retail price hike previously rolled out by fertiliser manufacturers. The subsidy hike is set at INR 1211.55 for every 50-kilogram bag from an earlier rate of INR 511.55.
DAP is the second common fertiliser in the agriculture sector standing second to Urea in terms of sale quantity. The subsidy scheme affects DAP uniquely since the Government has provided a fixed per tonne subsidy to this fertiliser. Which means that the MRP on it is decontrolled, variable and mostly decided by the manufacturers. However, the subsidy remains static.

All other non-urea fertilisers will attract Nutrient based Subsidy (NBS) with variable rates. Depending on the content of nutrients like Nitrogen (N), Phosphorous (P) and Sulphur (S) in the fertiliser, the per-tonne NBS rates vary.

A farming crisis has been thwarted by the Government with the subsidy hike. The raised subsidy of DAP will protect farmers against surging prices of the substance owing to global increase in cost of raw materials.

Rise in price of DAP would have severely affected Indian farmers since growing crops like Soyabean that need DAP fertiliser would cost an average of INR 1900 or higher.

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A stimulus package of INR 6.29 Lakh Cr was announced which comprises Government guarantee to banks and microfinance institutions for loans.

What’s in it for me?

The fertiliser subsidy has come at the right time since it will cushion prices for farmers when rising global rates have prompted manufacturers of fertilisers to hike prices. Setup and running costs will considerably reduce for agri-tech with the subsidy hike and farmers will not have to bear the brunt of international price hikes on fertilisers and their raw materials.

This decision by the Government is largely in the farmers’ interest. It’s also a one-time measure to mitigate Covid impact. The stimulus package will be in place until the global price hike on fertiliser sustains. There is hope for prices to return to their original rates during which time the Government will once again undertake a review and revision of the subsidy. The timing is crucial since the kharif sowing season is upon the Agri-tech industry and during this time, the stakeholders needed the support from the Government.

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Farmer Inside, Engineer Outside!

Abhilash Bapanasha — Tue, 20 Jul 2021 08:25:51 +0000

Milk, a daily essential in every Indian household, has a unique pattern of production, processing and marketing. India is the world’s largest milk producer and consumer of dairy products and with a unique consumption pattern, the country consumes almost 100 percent of its own milk production.

Mr. Kishore Indukuri was our speaker in our recently held tete-a-tete talk show – ‘Innerview – Only the Paranoid Survive’. The 45-minute motivational and inspirational talk show which features interviews of industry experts who bring forth informative and life experiences and techniques to help shape and gear you up, to succeed. Mr. Indukuri spoke about his journey and the pinnacle of his achievements. This in-depth, casual interview is a deep dive to the stimulating aspirations during the pursuit of his entrepreneurial goals.

Mr. Kishore Indukuri, the Founder & CEO of Sid’s Farm – the Engineer Farmer who has disrupted Dairy Farming in India. His brainchild Sid’s Farm is a sustainable agriculture and dairy farming start-up. He is an IIT Kharagpur graduate with a Ph.D. in Polymer Science and Engineering from University of Massachusetts. After quitting his job at Intel and having lived in the US for over a decade, he wanted to return to his roots and decided to head back home. While in his home town Hyderabad he started looking for sources of affordable natural and organic food for his family and found that the options were very limited and not easily accessible. This quest for the best initiated his venture, Sid’s Farm, named after his son.

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A lot more people are also coming (into dairy farming) because it is an essential item and it was not disrupted as much as some of the other fields were (during the pandemic) because still farmers and dairy producers were able to sell these essential services. There will be a lot of demand for good food produced in the country.

Here are some excerpts from the interview:

Today in 2021, how will you summarise the dairy farming industry? Where does it stand today?

If you look at the dairy farming itself, it is predominantly still unorganised but if you look at farming per se you know the one good thing about dairy farming is that it contributes at least four percent of the economy. This is one industry where at the current levels, at least greater than 50 percent of what the consumer pays actually goes to the farmer. If you look at any particular sector in agri-space, dairy is by far the largest commodity and there’s a lot of scope in dairy. In India, the demand for milk is continuously increasing and most of the milk produced in India is consumed in the country, so there’s a lot of scope for dairy to grow in India.

When we look around the situation right now, we are surviving amidst this global pandemic and we have seen a lot of focus being shifted to taking care of one’s health so how do you think the agriculture sector as a traditional sector is addressing the betterment of human health?

There is definitely a lot of focus on eating healthy food, so definitely the focus is back on having those great sources of food like milk etc. People are looking for high quality pesticide-free and contamination-free vegetables. Everywhere in the country and in the world, we are witnessing the demand which got spurred by the pandemic. A lot more people are also coming because it is an essential item and it was not disrupted as much as some of the other fields were because farmers and dairy producers were able to sell these essential services. There will be a lot of demand for good food produced in the country. Luckily there is food now in the country for most of the population, I think now the focus is on how do we make the good, better.

Contamination is again a serious issue that we are facing with the use of pesticides and chemicals being injected that is questioning the quality of food products. So as an entrepreneur, what solution do you suggest one can adopt to address this?

This is a question that we have also faced as a producer as to how do you evoke that trust in your consumer. We use testing and primarily showcasing that to the consumer as a big way to make sure the customers know that our milk is pure. So, we do a lot of testing at the farm and at consumers’ homes. During pre-COVID, we used to bring customers to the farm, show them how we milk a cow, how we grow our grass, how we do concentrated feed at our farmer facilities, how milk that comes from our facility is tested and all the series of testing that they go through. We test for them different kinds of preservatives and antibiotics that can be added and injected in a cow. Similarly, any food product that you take, if you can develop or there are already test techniques out there, if you can take those things, leverage them and show to the customer, that our food products or our milk goes through this and that, is why you can believe that our food is good. I think that is a great way to connect to a customer and bring that trust in your blood in our products.

In the presentation shared by Dr. Indukuri, he elucidated the story of Sid’s Farm. Some excerpts:

When we started, our initial business plan was to have an integrated farm that produces great milk and food without any hormones, antibiotics and pesticides. Our plan was that we will have three to four acres of land that will have sheds for animals, it will have processing equipment and any other land that we need we would take on lease. Each farm will have an in-house pasture facility for milk and milk products. We also wanted to see if along with milk and milk products we also should be growing other vegetables as well. With a little bit of information that we knew about, we put together this business plan in early 2012. So, the idea was we would buy 50 cows and for each animal in those days, it was about 45,000. Then we would know what is the investment in preparing feed for these animals. It is important to make sure that you grow your grass or feed before you buy your animals when you start a dairy farm. This is so as to know what is the cost for an acre of land, what is the cost of seeds, what is the cost of manure, what is the labour cost and number of acres.

In 365 days, cows have to be milked two times a day, every day no matter what. There are no breaks here, people who have been in this field know they can’t attend marriages, they can’t do all the things that you think are important. In 2013, when we started selling milk direct to our customers and we would a milk our cows started us 4 am in the morning we would manually packet our milk and then we would take that milk from our farm to the city which was about 40 kilometres away and by 6-6:30 in the morning we would have the milk reach our customers. As demand for our milk increased in an automatic packing machine, packing is not a problem now.

Fodder is the most important thing. You have to make sure the land that you choose the location of your dairy farm is also very important so you make sure that you have a good amount of water in the facility where you are starting your dairy farm because both for your cattle for drinking as well as for growing grass you need quite a bit of water so water source is important if you are closer to a river belt you can do it at a fairly low cost. You should also put up a low-cost protein source, like at our farm we have azolla ponds and along with it we are also growing a few tree fodders like suspenia, moringa (or moonaga as they call here).

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It is important to make sure that you grow your grass or feed before you buy your animals when you start a dairy farm.

Audience Asks

Any suggestions on what methods to use for testing on or analysing the business models regularly.

I am assuming that this is the dairy farming business model so one of my suggestions is you start with a basic exercise excel model. That is what we started with and continuously adding the new numbers. It will give you a fair estimate of where you are today compared to what your estimates were, if you keep plugging in. In a dairy farm, I think in the first six months there is a lot of valuable data – you have your first set of cows that are producing milk, once those animals start to dry off you know you have to bring in your next set of animals that keep your milk cycle going. That time frame is a good check. If you capture daily productivity data, your weight cost data, that will give you a decent amount of data to make sure whether your initial business model you started out with is working or not.

What are your thoughts in adopting environment friendly packaging options? What will be the effects on costing?

We do get a lot of questions about this as well, so we are looking for what are the great solutions out there that are environmentally friendly. If you take the example of packing your milk in a plastic pouch, one of the things that we get is why don’t we do glass bottles. There are technologies out there where you can do it in biodegradable packaging options, so we are continuously evaluating them. But you have to look at every aspect as you make this decision. It is about the entire supply chain. When I say, for example, when we look at the plastic pouch versus glass model it is not just the filling stage or what the consumer would see at the end, it also costs you to transport it. If you look at our delivery boy, he could probably carry a lot more milk. He would be able to deliver probably 80 to 100 litres of milk when it is delivered via plastic boxes but when you do via glass bottles you can only deliver maybe 40 litres of milk at the most. Again, what does it run and how much water are you using, if for example you use a glass bottle or a stainless-steel bottle then it has to be cleaned daily and then repackaged. How much water are you using, what are your costs of doing this entire thing has to be looked at and then arrived at a solution. Having said that, we are constantly pushing ourselves to see what is the best technology out there and are looking for good options to take up biodegradable packaging materials once they are out there tested and available.

Have you approached the state government previously for incentives and for expanding your business at an all-India level?

We have definitely applied for state government incentives. We have applied some of the incentives for the processing side of our business but not availed any incentives for the dairy farming side. Because when we started, we didn’t know enough about incentives and stuff, so we didn’t apply. There are a lot of Central Government schemes from the Ministry of Food Processing. We were part of an incubator, which was a central government institution where we applied for a grant there as well, so as many as you can get it’s great because it will help allocate money for the right things in the business.

In the words of Dr. Indukuri, “Dairy farming can be a successful venture but it needs a lot of personal attention at least in the initial few years.” From his experience as a successful dairy entrepreneur whose venture, Sid’s Farm now clocks Rs 40 Crore in revenue annually delivering milk to nearly 10,000 plus customers every day, he is hopeful of the dairy sector in the coming future.

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Dvara E-Registry Building a Digital Platform Enabling Stakeholders in Agri Value Chain

Shalmoli Sarkar — Tue, 13 Jul 2021 05:35:13 +0000

India, predominantly an agrarian economy contributing a significant 16 percent in GDP and employing 43 percent face hindrances to reach its full potential due to farmers lacking access to formal sources of finance.

Availability of agriculture credit to farmers is crucial for running the operational expenses in farming resulting in better crop produce as one gets access to quality inputs such as seeds, fertilisers, machinery and equipment, and sufficient supply of water and power.

Credit also acts as a cushion for the farmers to sustain livelihood in inevitable situations of crop damage due to crop failure, price crash, drought, pest attacks, hailstone shower, etc.

According to a report from the Reserve Bank of India, at most, only 40 percent of India’s small and marginal farmers have access to formal credit. Therefore, leaving the rest with no other choice but to knowingly fall into the trap of informal sources of rural credit.

This untapped segment presents an opportunity for Agriculture-Fintech startups which can play a pivotal role in lessening the gap in the non-availability of formal sources of agricultural credit to the farmers.

According to a report from EY, the overall agritech industry is estimated to be a market worth $24.1 billion by 2025, out of which agricultural financial services, the second largest after agri-supply chain, will be a market worth $4.1 billion by 2025.

Meanwhile, Omnivore’s recent $150 million funds to boost rural agritech has benefitted Dvara E-Registry, an AgFinTech startup, that has raised a pre-Series A round of funding.

What Does Dvara E-Registry Do?

Dvara E-Registry aims to channel financial products to farmers and FPO (Follow on Public Offer) through its digital platform. Its digital platform harnessing technologies like mobile and GIS and Machine Learning includes smallholder farmer’s access to financial services and agricultural markets. The startup has worked with over 55+ FPOs and impacted the lives of over 25000+ farmers.

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According to a report from EY, the overall agritech industry is estimated to be a market worth $24.1 billion by 2025, out of which agricultural financial services, the second largest after agri-supply chain, will be a market worth $4.1 billion by 2025.

How is Dvara E-registry Helping the farmers?

Dvara E-registry is aiding the farmer’s access to insurance and credit through its digital solutions which are listed below :

Doordrishti

It provides index-based land and crop analytics by leveraging ML and AI on remote sensing data, weather data, GIS data, and crop science. Using a proprietary android mobile app equipped with sensors it captures the data by georeferencing the land plots. The data captured is fed into a machine learning algorithm which on analysing provides real-time tech-enabled advisory based on which helps farmers access financial products like credit and insurance. The insights generated also help understand a lender about a farmer’s borrowing capacity.

Khetscore

It provides an AI-based farm score to agricultural activity. The score is created leveraging the statistics on weather, satellite data, and crop yield data to assess what can maximise farmers’ satisfaction and optimise loss ratio while keeping premiums within a limit. The yield estimates derived by these models are used to assess insurance claims at a land parcel level.

Monitoring cultivation activities

Dvara E-Registry provides a platform for all farmers to digitally monitor land and cultivation practices by sharing actionable crop insights by leveraging Artificial Intelligence, Remote Sensing and Image technologies. The farmers are provided a detailed analysis of crop reports based on their cultivable area, growth stage, health, expected harvest date and estimated yield.

These insights help the food companies understand the procurement requirements and convey trading parameters like payment and delivery terms, quality specifications of commodity, quality-wise premium or discount, minimum traded quantity to the farmers beforehand.

Learnings from Dvara E-Registry to the other Agfintech Players

Establishing Transparency

Dvara E-Registry has established transparency in communication with the farmers and the FPOs with its digital solutions communicating real-time data about the agricultural activity.

Better Decision making

Leveraging ML and AI to generate insights about the estimates of agricultural activity will increase operational efficiency in decision-making for lenders regarding sanction, review, and renewal of agricultural loans.

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Gurugram Ag-tech Start-up Krishify Crosses GMV of Rs 300 Cr

Anju Nambiar — Thu, 08 Jul 2021 03:35:05 +0000

Who is Krishify?

Krishify is a Gurugram based Agritech start-up which offers a social networking, trading and knowledge sharing platform for farmers in India. It’s a mobile-first, vernacular platform that works like a one-stop networking solution for farmers.

What does it do?

Through the platform, farmers can connect to key stakeholders including their colleagues, farm traders and distributors, equipment sellers, veterinarians and logistics service providers. The start-up is addressing farmer challenges by looking at it from their lifecycle perspective. They help farmers collaborate with multiple stakeholders by adapting to their dynamic needs.

Krishify’s technology solution has leveraged the strong internet and digital penetration among the farming community to connect them with the right stakeholders at the right time.

Krishify offers a range of services as follows:

A farm marketplace called ‘Krishi Bazaar’ with a ‘Kharid Bikri’ section where farmers can trade farm products and equipment like seeds, crops, cattle, fertilisers, tractors, etc.
The ‘Krishify Dukaan’ app for Agri stakeholders to sell products to farmers.
Scientific agriculture advisory services
Access to government schemes and benefits in agriculture.
Farm services like connectivity to veterinarians and agriculture experts.

Krishify crossed a GMV of INR 300 Cr: What this brings to the table?

In May, Krishify announced that the company had clocked a GMV (Gross Merchandise Value) of INR 300 Cr.

What is GMV?

GMV is the total valuation of merchandise which was sold and subsequently purchased on a marketplace (here, an online platform) between users (buyers and sellers) for a specific period of time.

What does this bring to the table for Krishify?

A GMV of INR 300 Cr indicates that 300 crores worth of farm equipment, products and services were exchanged through the Krishify platform. It shows how Krishify’s farm networking platform has a high frequency of transactions.

It also indicates that the existing users are heavily utilising the platform. With the increase in their user pool, the frequency of transactions will exponentially increase.

How Krishify is disrupting the vernacular space

Indian farmers are mostly perceived as Hindi-speaking rural residents. But the truth is that nationwide farmers belong to multiple different states. They speak local languages like Marathi, Kannada, Telugu, Bengali, Assamese, etc.

Krishify is disrupting the vernacular space in agritech by offering local language interfaces on their digital product. They first picked Hindi as their base language since their first batch of onboarded farmers were mainly from Bihar and Jharkhand.

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A GMV of INR 300 Cr indicates that 300 crores worth of farm equipment, products and services were exchanged through the Krishify platform.

What’s in it for me?

The coming of age of vernacular online users has added to the pool of internet consumers who want to use apps and websites completely in local languages. Apps and start-ups in the vernacular space first need to connect with their audience.

For instance, if you are targeting Marathi or Bengali speaking users, you need hands on interaction with them. Connect with potential users physically on-ground. Converse with them in their local language and that’s how you can ease the process of onboarding them.

Whether you are creating a vernacular social media platform, app, or any other technology solution, you need to identify the language which will give you maximum coverage. Do keep in mind that if you are targeting hyperlocal languages, you will have a niche audience. The language barrier is the only thing that’s keeping farmers in India from agricultural technology solutions.

The agriculture consumer base spans more than half the population of India belonging to remote villages. Vernacular tech solutions in agriculture thus have massive potential. Overcome this last barrier and there will be no dearth to the tech platforms that you can build to help farmers maximize their outputs.

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Seed Fund Opportunity for Early Stage Agri-tech Start-ups

Anju Nambiar — Tue, 06 Jul 2021 08:35:06 +0000

EGreens, an investment firm headquartered in Delhi focuses specifically on Agri-tech start-ups. They have launched a seed fund valued at $2.1 M (INR 15 Cr) for early-stage investments into agri-tech start-ups.

Eligibility Criteria for Start-ups

Early stage Agri-tech start-ups in India are eligible beneficiaries for funding.
Start-ups that operate on disruptive business models spread across the end-to-end value chain of food production, storage and transportations can be at the receiving end of the funding.
Start-ups who are providers of market linkages are eligible.
Start-ups who leverage technologies like AI (Artificial Intelligence) and ML (Machine Learning) in farming practices are eligible.
Start-ups who implement IoT (Internet of Things) across the supply chain also come within the scope of benefits.

The Objective

The objective behind EGreens is to identify and invest in start-ups that are offering last-mile delivery solutions in the agriculture sector. EGreens is interested in utilising valuable opportunities to fund Agri-tech start-ups that will address the fragmented agricultural supply chain in India.

With the inception of this new fund, EGreens wants to make a move into food distribution and retail from the FMCG sector. EGreens is also a ‘people first retail company’ alongside its investment firm and has amassed decades worth of experience in the FMCG sector.

Start-up funding success

EGreens has made its maiden investment of INR 15 Cr ($2.1 M) in its in-house brand VegEase. VegEase is a food retail brand which delivers fresh fruits and vegetables to customers’ homes through its ‘cart-at-home’ model.

After being bootstrapped by its parent company, VegEase acquired a user base of over 5000 customers within a span of 3 months. It has also reported a volume of 200 orders per month. They have also established two warehouses in two cities Delhi and Gurugram, each spanning 9000 sq. ft. in total area. They have also achieved a turnover of INR 7 M and reported a return rate of 0.25% in their sales which is tremendous given the average industry return rate in this segment is 2-3%.

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The objective behind EGreens is to identify and invest in start-ups that are offering last-mile delivery solutions in the agriculture sector.

What’s in it for me?

EGreens is prioritising its future investments for Agri-tech firms that can create forward and backward integration with its own venture ‘VegEase’. EGreens will surely fund Agri-tech start-ups in India which will help both EGreens and VegEase diversify their market footprints from B2C to B2B and B2B2C.

There are several Agri-tech focused investors in India alongside EGreens like Omnivore, Nabvebtures, India Quotient, Accion Venture Labs, Aavishkaar, WEH Ventures and Ankur Capital to name a few with similar investment philosophies. WEH Ventures, a Venture Capital firm based in Mumbai has already launched its second seed fund of INR 100 Cr after the successful launch of its first seed fund corpus of INR 40 Cr for Agri-tech start-ups in India.

EGreens wants to invest in companies that are focused on consumer insights since these are the firms that will drive assured growth.

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Farmer Empowerment by Agri-Tech Start-Up Rise Hydroponics

Anju Nambiar — Mon, 21 Jun 2021 08:35:04 +0000

Rise Hydroponics is an Agri-tech start-up based in Ahmedabad. Founded in April 2020, this relatively new entrant to the Agri-tech and most importantly, the Hydroponics space has 3 co-founders, Tusshar Agarwal, Meet Patel and Vivek Shukla. Rise Hydroponics is a completely bootstrapped start-up.

What is Rise Hydroponics doing?

Rise Hydroponics is mainly developing indoor and outdoor Hydroponics farm projects. They want to foster an urban farming community within India’s agriculture sector. There is less awareness about Hydroponic farming among India’s rural farmers. Rise Hydroponics understands this and is approaching customers from an educational standpoint.

Rise Hydroponics’ business model is divided into four categories:

Hydroponic Farm Infrastructure setup

They set up indoor or rooftop commercial Hydroponics farms for their clients (mostly farmers). These farms are vertical setups with controlled environment and temperature conditions. They undertake end-to-end infrastructure setup which mostly involves setting up of the greenhouse, the vertical rows of pipe and inlet setup, and supplying the crop specific nutrients for the farmers.

Providing Technology Walkthrough

The company also provides walkthroughs for clients regarding the technology operating the farms. The hydroponic farms operate on IoT based automation and can be managed on a remote SaaS based platform. The web based dashboard is to be utilised by farmers and the farm workers to access real-time condition of the crops from anywhere.

E-Commerce store

They has its very own e-commerce store ‘Rise Freshz’ where they sell their in-house hydroponic produce like Kale and Basil, Baby Spinach, Arugula, Herbs, Product Combos, and more. They also sell subscription-based harvest boxes.

Training Sessions

The start-up also conducts training sessions for farmers so that they can manage their hydroponics farms independently. They undertake weekly training sessions and workshops where farmers obtain key insights like crop selection. The training involves Hydroponics Technology understanding, technical aspects of training, Commercial Aspects of Hydroponics farming, and more.

Empowering Indian farmers with Soilless farming

Rise Hydroponics plans to empower farmers with ‘end-to-end soilless farming solutions’. Rise Hydroponics has taken up the task of educating farmers about the benefits of growing crops in a soilless, nutrient-rich solution:

Faster growth
Richer yield

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Rise Hydroponics has taken up the task of educating farmers about the benefits of growing crops in a soilless, nutrient-rich solution – faster growth and richer yield.

What’s in it for me?

Hydroponic farming is a branch of Agri-tech that is at the fledgling stage but one that’s becoming increasingly popular. Before venturing into Hydroponics, start-ups should understand that this farming method is best suited for growing vegetables like Lettuce, Basil, Cherry Tomatoes, Oregano and Thyme.

The market for these vegetables is in supermarkets, restaurants and nutrition institutes. Depending on your location, thoroughly research on the profitability and local demand for these crops.

Urban consumers in Tier I and II cities are the biggest target consumer base for Hydroponics produce. The import market for Hydroponics produce also has high demand since these veggies are popular and have high consumption rates in countries like the UAE, US, Canada, etc.

You can grow exotic veggies in your very own Hydroponic farm and sell it either through e-commerce or by supplying to restaurant or supermarket chains both in India and abroad. However, if you want to venture into Hydroponic farm setup projects for farming clients, you should know that costs vary depending on a number of factors like farming process and materials used, area occupied by the set-up and the types of crops to be grown.

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India-Israel’s 3-year Work Programme to Transform Agriculture Industry

Aakash Sharma — Mon, 07 Jun 2021 01:35:05 +0000

India and Israel have signed a three-year action plan agreement to promote agricultural cooperation. In the course of three years (till 2023), the bilateral agreement is characterised as a joint action plan to strengthen technology-driven agricultural cooperation between the two nations.

So far, four joint action plans have been successfully completed. This is the fifth Indo-Israeli Agriculture Action Plan (IIAP). As part of the first plan, Centres of Excellence (COE) were established to train farmers in Israeli agriculture and water technology.

However, according to the new action plan, a model of agro-ecosystem excellence called Villages of Excellence (VoE) will be set up in eight states and 13 centres of excellence in 75 Indian villages. This will increase net income and improve the livelihood of individual farmers by converting traditional farms into modern intensive farms based on IIAP standards.

What is the New Three-year Work Programme for India?

The New Three-year Work Programme is an attempt to strengthen the bilateral relations and cooperation between the two countries in agriculture to benefit the farming community. The Centres of Excellence established as part of the Israeli action plan will significantly impact the doubling of farmers’ incomes. The program will exchange technology between India and Israel to increase the productivity and quality of agriculture using new tools, technology and digital adoption.

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The Action Plan aims to expand existing COEs and encourage private companies and partnerships.

The programme aims to grow existing Centres of Excellence, establish new centres, increase CoE’s value chain, and bring the Centres of Excellence into the independent convention. Both countries are implementing the “INDO-ISRAEL Agricultural Project Centres of Excellence” and “INDO-ISRAEL Villages of Excellence”.

India-Israel Villages of Excellence (IIVOE)

This is a new concept to create a model ecosystem in agriculture across eight states, alongside 13 Centers of Excellence within 75 villages. The program will encourage the increase of net income and better the subsistence of the individual farmer, converting traditional farms into modern-intensive fields based on Indo-Israel Agriculture Action Plan (IIAP) models.

Stakeholders will tailor a large-scale and complete value chain approach with economic sustainability, embedded with Israeli novel technologies and methodologies to local conditions. The IIVOE program will focus on:

Modern Agriculture Infrastructure

Capacity Building

Market Linkage

Bright Hopes for Farmers and SMEs operating in agriculture

As witnessed within the existing Indo-Israel projects, digital collaboration in agriculture has helped build the sector majorly. Further technological advancements will also help break the monopoly and decentralise the pricing mechanism and reduce transaction costs, thus guaranteeing higher yields to farmers.

Since farming is a productive data-driven sector, start-ups and SMEs providing digital tools can dramatically improve the livelihood of farmers by giving them easy to use digital tools to operate on and protecting them against price volatility.

Simple gadgets like mobile phones also enable farmers to integrate and operate in structured markets. SMEs in the agritech sector must recognise this area and work to help India’s most significant human capital segment to easily avail solutions like digital money, Direct Benefit Transfer system, online guides, etc.

Self-controlled watering systems, soil and crop experimentation through IoT devices, data analytics to increase crop yield, an online marketplace for farm produce, and alternate credit for farming entrepreneurs are areas where agritech SMEs can deliver breakthroughs. Indeed, agri-tech start-ups and companies, with government support, will disrupt traditional agriculture through technology, and the recent Indo-Israel programme is a step towards betterment.

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