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.
