India’s Green Revolution 2.0 is here in the form of agritech that is transforming the country’s agriculture industry. The digitization of our agriculture is already underway. Three significant changes have enabled agri-tech players in the ecosystem:
Agritech does not merely imply using a mobile app to facilitate the trading of agricultural commodities. A true agritech company builds an entire tech-driven ecosystem from ‘soil to sale’.
The potential for infusing technology in agriculture is enormous and feeding on this are a huge number of startups (around 600-700) dominating the Indian agritech ecosystem.
According to a Ken Research report, the Indian agritech market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 32% from FY20 to FY25, with Karnataka, Maharashtra, and Delhi-NCR leading the charge in the country.
With India having a large but fragmented and complex food supply chain, there are a number of problems to solve. Today, there are post-harvest losses of around USD 13 billion in agricultural value which is a wastage of over 40% of food even before it reaches the end consumer. This is driving agritech companies to find new ways to use technology to address the same.
So, what are agritech companies promising? Their goal is to make supply chains efficient in addition to providing better access to agriculture inputs for farmers as also building resilience. They offer technology solutions with buyer-supplier matching as a central function to connect different stakeholders in the value chain. Their integrated value-add services in logistics and warehousing, quality assessment, traceability, and financial services can create a huge impact on farmer incomes.
Big agri companies are also in the race, and are trying to develop their own apps and software platforms. According to an Inc42 report, among all the sub-sectors in agritech, market linkage has the highest potential to reach USD 12 billion by 2025.
With so many smart agri solutions in the market, how can our farmers choose the right one?
One of the major challenges is that most agritech platforms focus on solving one aspect of the supply chain, and farmers need cohesive solutions that address the entire production process. They may feel overwhelmed with the many solutions offered and from the need to log in to separate platforms.
Most farmers in India are marginal or small landholding farmers, and hence, may not even be technologically capable of comprehending smart data. These specific challenges require hyperlocal solutions that work in local demands and context.
Another moot point is – how can agritech companies use the data on their apps to help farmers add value to the entire food chain? How can they translate data back to increase production efficiencies on the farm? Farmers don’t just need smartphones; they need smart inputs as well. They need technology support at every stage of the agri value chain from soil to sale, from farm to fork.
As India’s only multidimensional full-stack agri-commerce company, WayCool Foods has a whole gamut of tech interventions that help crop cultivation planning, enhance farm productivity, ensure food traceability, create transparency in pricing, eliminate supply chain inefficiencies and food wastage. These also help manage a cost-effective distribution system so that everyone benefits – farmers get improved returns for their produce, and consumers get fresh and safe food.
The time has come for India’s agritech ecosystem to evolve to the next level, and WayCool is leading this change from the front.
