HOW OVERWHELMING IT IS, WHEN DAY BY DAY YOU COME ACROSS INNOVATIONS MORE INNOVATIVE THAN THE OTHER
As the government aims to increase the Indian farmer’s income to incredible numbers by 2020, many budding entrepreneurs find the ecosystem in the country to be very supportive and encouraging. With a number of trailblazers and front runners doing wonders in the field, THE CAPITAL POST is continuously discovering such pioneers in the farming industry, of which the next is Shashank Vatsa!
Shashank, a 33-yr old young social entrepreneur has bloomed in glory when six years ago he established an app and medium that now caters A to Z needs of the farmers. It was in 2012 that Shashank with his other four founding members innovated an app that served to be the one-stop destination for the marginalized farmers. From informing and advising the peasants about the various good agricultural technologies, usage of correct weedicides and pesticicdes, guiding the farmers on good seeds, making them aware of the correct value of their produces in the market to connecting many micro entrepreneurs with each other, and educating them even about the rates per day and how and when to sell the produce to get the maximum benefit, DeHaat, provides the farmers a unique blend of education and technology.
PROVIDING AGRI. DOCTORS
The talented IIT Delhi graduate (2008), Vatsa, used his intellectual skills and recognized soon that farmers are those strata in society who have less access to smart phones and other technological advancements. So, unlike many other organizations working for farmers, he has idolized of developing a system which transcends the dire need of technology and hence came up with an idea of developing a network of trained micro entrepreneurs working at the ground level so that they can help peasants in-person and work in and out for them.
HOW DeHaaT DIFFERS?
DeHaat, currently, focuses on 3 major agri services – Agri Input, Crop advisory & Market linkage of farm produce. Farmers can place the order related to any of their agri need through DeHaat help line (1800 270 1420), through mobile application – DeHaat or simply they can go to their closest DeHaat physical centers. The demand from farmers is transferred to respective DeHaat micro entrepreneurs (coordinators) and fulfilled on same day. Each DeHaat micro-entrepreneur caters to 600-800 farmers in a radius of 3-5 km. These micro-entrepreneurs also use “DeHaat for Business” application to enroll farmers, to aggregate various demand, to visit farm, to capture crop based query & to aggregate the farm produce.
KNOW WHAT WILL YOU KNOW?
- When and where to sell your produce
- What pesticides and weedicides you should use
- The new and apt agricultural practices
- The current cost of your produce
- Provides market to your product
- In some cases provides you initial capital
STIMULUS LEADING TO DISCOVERY
“It was when I was working with management consulting firm after graduation, that I learned the gaps in the supply chain for various bulk buyers”-Shashank Vatsa
Vatsa originally belongs to a farming community of Bihar. Though he had not lived ever in rurals, he had exposure of the difficulties being faced by farmers on day to day basis. This was the trigger point to create a sustainable business model in agriculture and around small farmers and then DeHaat took birth!
MORE YOU CUT, THE MORE YOU SHINE
“The very first difficulty one faces is to approach the farmers and earn their confidence as we hardly have lived in villages; we all somewhere belong to rural though. So we don’t fit in. Beside the very low level of technological advancements available to farmers, the data unavailability remains another challenge”–Shashank Vatsa
However, collecting revenue from sales of farm produce to institution & sales of agri inputs to farmers, the poised organization has managed to make 12.5 crore revenue for FY-2017. It doesn’t charges for crop advisory from farmers; 72% of overall revenue comes from the market linkage of farm produce and remaining from agri input as Shashank Vatsa asserts. With this DeHaat witnesses a long journey of success!
DeHaat ACROSS INDIA
Currently, 80+ DeHaat micro entrepreneurs are serving more than 42,000 farmers in Bihar, U.P. & Odisha for their various agri demands related to Input, Information & Market linkage. DeHaat platform has already listed 350+ different agricultural inputs from companies like UPL, IIL, IFFCO, DuPont, Tata, Bayer & Yara. More than 65 institutional buyers are also associated for their agricultural raw material procurement directly from farmers.
“We aim to set 400 DeHaat centers covering 200,000 farmers in the upcoming year, and expanding to MP, Maharashtra and Rajasthan by the end of 2019”–Shashank Vatsa
SUCCESS IS SOMETHING WHICH DOESN’T REFLECTS IN YOUR BALANCE SHEET, IT IMPACTS THE COMMON MASSES RATHER!
RECOGNITIONS
- NASSCOM
- Vodafone Mobile for Good
- Millennium Alliance
- Niti Aayog, GOI
- Ashoka Fellow in 2013
- Featured under Forbes 30 under 30 in 2014
- Part of “Champions of Change” in 2017