For smallholder farmers, we need to take the conversation from increasing income to increasing profit and provide tools & support so that they can manage & increase their per-acre profits.
For 50+ crops team has put together detailed calculations on what profit a farmer can make per acre if the farmer follows best practices suggested by HFN experts
Our work doesn't stop just at reducing inputs or increasing yield per acre, we provide farmer support in getting discovered by buyers in a very systematic approach.
Our portal for corporate buyers provide a bird' eye view of the entire supply available through the HFN ecosystem (spread across 30 states/UT) but also provide full traceability of farm products up to the level of seed used for production.
Team is looking into building phenological crop models to accurately predict the crop growth with changing weather conditions based on seed and soil quality. This will give very good idea on exactly how much yield to expect to the buyers.
Check this video first....did you notice handshakes under the handkerchief? If not, watch again...
If you want to learn what is happening, continue reading this thread (and RT this thread)
In mandi, Adatiya (trader) is supposed to do open bidding for farm produce, when a farmer brings it to the "gaddi" (platform where adatiya sits)
Open bidding, so that interested buyers can see the product, and hopefully outbid each other and hence farmer getting the best price
However open bidding rarely happens in reality.
When the farmer brings his crop, adatiya and his favourite buyers starts checking out product and negotiates products in plain sight under the handkerchief or a towel or maybe under kurta they may be wearing
What smallholder farmers need is handholding in this new world order.. where they ARE going to be competing with likes of Amazon’s , Reliance and more..
Government/opposition might be able to delay/reduce competition a bit but they will not be able to stop it from happening
Farmers faces issues in three broad categories :
(1) Access to market (2) Access to quality affordable inputs (3) Access to financial services
But there is one underlying issue which creates all the above issues and that is ...
‘Information Asymmetry between farmers and other stakeholders in the value chain’
Simply put farmers are not getting accurate info on what consumers want, what price they are going to pay, what they can do differently to get better pricing