Agriculture is one of the major sectors that dominates Indian economy. More than half of the Indian population is working for agriculture sector. It is not just a way of employment for the rural area but also is a part of lifestyle. Farming in India has deep history, dated back even before the Indus Valley Civilization. This sector kept evolving over the course of the time.
Before independence, India had to import food from other countries. But, after the green revolution, the country is self-sufficient to supply food to its people. Apart from that, there are still some problems regarding the traditional methods of farming in India, efficient use of inputs and high yield crop varieties. The fluctuation in the rain also leads to loss of yield. Hence, proper planning and guidance is required to face the problems and boost the production, while not harming the soil by over using chemicals.
This necessity gave birth to a company named Krishika (Sacred River Agri Technologies Pvt Ltd). Krishika is an Agritech / Agri retail company headquartered in Noida. It is a farmer centric brand, which was started with the objective of providing crop lifecycle management services and quality inputs to the farmers directly at the grassroots level. The company provides free expert guidance to the farmers at their fields, and retails high quality farm inputs.
Reaching to Grass Root Level
Krishika has a hyperlocal presence through its chain of physical fulfilment centres called Krishika Kisaan Marts, and trained agronomists called Krishika Kisaan Saarathis. The network has expanded to 20 locations across 10 districts in Central and Eastern Uttar Pradesh within its first year of operations. The company has so far recruited and trained over 60+ agriculture graduates to meet the growing requirements of direct farm advisory.
Krishika has pioneered a unique model of assisted e-commerce, wherein a farmer micro entrepreneur is being appointed and trained as a Kisaan Saarathi. Each such Kisaan Saarathi covers a cluster of 4-5 villages, giving the company a deeper outreach in a cost-efficient manner. The Kisaan Saarathi carries out surveys and accumulates demand on behalf of the farmers on the mobile app at the local level. The uniqueness of the solution is its scalability on a low-cost basis and the impact it creates at the grassroot level.
It provides valuable guidance at hyperlocal level assisted with e-commerce model. Krishika is also developing a network of brick & mortar experience/training centres, which serve as fulfilment centres and warehouses. It is a combination of physical presence along with technology making us DIGICAL (Digital + Physical). Besides the basic input retail model, Krishika has added benefits of technology assisted e-commerce, free farmer advisory, and training and educational programs. This is how Krishika was started.
Brain Behind the Idea
Mr. Anshumali Dwivedi is the Founder of Krishika. He is the former CEO of Port of Algoma, Ontario, Canada. He is Member of the Board at Northern Ontario Angels – one of the largest angel networks in North America. He comes with strong insights and industry linkages and has been an active investor.
He holds an honours degree in economics from Delhi University and MBA from Indian Institute of Foreign Trade, New Delhi. He is passionate about the agri-tech sector and has been spending considerable time pursuing tech solutions for Indian agriculture sector which can be bundled together in a scalable manner to create a cashflow positive business.
Anshumali is an early-stage investor and has funded start-ups in the past. As per his opinion, urban India was saturated, and the rural markets were largely untapped with huge potential. So, he was looking for opportunities in the rural business and agriculture space. The scope in crop lifecycle management and agri input retail were very promising for Anshumali, not only as an investor, but also driving the business model directly and scaling it up.
Comprehensive Solutions at the Grassroots
Krishika offers agricultural inputs and expert farm advisory at hyperlocal level. It retails agri inputs such as seeds, fertilizers, pesticides, organic inputs, agri implements, and veterinary nutrients. These services are provided through the physical fulfilment centres, known as Krishika Kisaan Marts and through the e-Mart App.
Each company-operated centre is licensed to sell these inputs. These centres maintain desired varieties of the inputs in the warehouses attached to them, to cater the demand in its respective catchment area. A Kisaan Saarthi also collects orders on behalf of the farmers through the e-Mart app. The app is also equipped to conduct surveys.
The company has a core team of agri experts, which provides proper guidance to the farmers on crop lifecycle management and selecting the best quality agri inputs. It also operates an IVR enabled cloud based Kisaan helpline, where farmers can directly speak with Krishika’s agri experts. The agri experts also provide guidance about farms by visiting fields and carefully assessing the prevailing conditions on site.
Krishika conducts Kisaan Goshtis, which is a farmer outreach program. The Goshtis are conducted at regular intervals in different villages to educate and guide the farmers. These programs help in creating awareness about use of inputs, new varieties of seeds etc. It also helps in clean and sustainable agricultural practices. The Goshthis have helped farmers to increase their crop yields significantly.
Krishika has an app based online ordering system which is currently an assisted m-commerce platform. The company is also planning to venture into satellite-based imagery solutions in the near future, which will help in monitoring crop health at large scale.
Overcoming the Pandemic
Krishika was incorporated in the middle of the pandemic in May 2020 and began its operations in September 2020, around the 1st wave in India. Lockdowns did not impact the sales for established centres as agricultural activity was in the essential domain. However, launching new centres was delayed by almost a month due to the lockdowns in May 2021. The lockdown caused hindrances and issues like finalizing locations, obtaining licenses, and furnishing of stores.
The major challenge during the first year of operations has been the lockdown phase hampering rollout. Employees from centre and corporate office felt unwell at some points, which became a serious concern. It was difficult to launch new centres as government offices and other services remain closed, which hampered the progress of the work.
During lockdowns, the centres were running with minimum staff and all covid appropriate measures like masking and sanitization were taken. The corporate staff however worked from home during the lockdowns but slowly resumed work, when situation was under control.
Advice to the Youth
There are many solutions that keep coming up these days in the agriculture start-ups domain. Many of these are conceptually fancy but not in sync with the requirements of the farmer. The young generation of entrepreneurs should look for the challenges faced by farmers at the grassroot level and then find a practical solution to suit their needs.
It is crucial that farmer understands the complexity of product completely. Therefore, there must be enough training programs to create awareness and educate the community. Having direct connection with the farmers is very important and will be the biggest value driver.
A View on the Indian Agriculture Sector
Tech and E-commerce have already penetrated in urban India. Rural India has immense potential for tech-based products and services and is more of a sunrise sector now. Start-ups are working towards data digitization, data analytics, IOT, artificial intelligence, and machine learning to create systems with high predictive capability.
Agri-tech has become one of the areas with lot of activity. These tech-driven business models will help in reducing costs, increasing productivity, and ensure data helping push credit and insurance solutions to the farmers more efficiently. The major trends developing in the sector are – usage of precision farming with soil testing-based decisions, digitization of retailing in agriculture, usage of drones for tracking crop health, IOT based sensors for collecting field data and vertical farming.
