AgFarm: Empowering Agriculture Through Digitalization
AgFarm, the newly launched Dubai-based agro-inputs startup is seeking to reform the agrochemical industry via digital transformation. Founded by a young entrepreneur Vaman Alawadhi and his partner Mr Sandeep Chauhan, AgFarm is a first-of-its-kind agrochemical company in India whose products will only be available on nurture.retail, a leading agro-inputs e-commerce platform, at never-before attractive prices.
A step aligning with the government’s ‘Digital India’ initiative, AgFarm seeks to streamline the procurement processes, provide greater price transparency, and alleviate the pain points experienced by the distributors and farmers in purchasing the products. By skipping the traditional over-the-counter selling the company will empower all buyers to have greater supply chain transparency and will increase consumer trust in the products purchased as the customers will get to buy their authentic and quality products directly from them at attractive and affordable prices.
Most of the agrochemical channel partners and buyers reside in rural areas and in order to purchase the right products they either need to travel to the cities or set up their inventory with whatever is available nearby. The forward-looking company will make this usually inconvenient and time taking process easier for the customer through the internet. The customers will be able to save their valuable money and time as they will get to purchase the products from the comfort of their own homes or workplace with a few clicks. All they will need is a phone and internet connection. In case they are not satisfied with their placed orders they will be able to reconsider the transactions easily.
Unlike the offline stores or shops which are not only time-bound but are also dependent on many other external factors, the AgFarm products will be displayed online on the biggest E-commerce marketplaces 24X7 throughout the year. This will allow the distributors to plan their inventory more efficiently as time and weather won’t act as a barrier and they will be able to compare, choose and place the order at any time. Timely availability and application of innovative solutions shall contribute towards prompt pest management and will ensure a sustainable pace in direction of quality improvement and yield enhancement as well. Other than tracking their order and getting the delivery of AgFarm products at their doorstep the buyers will also get additional discounts by using digital payment modes.
“This is the age of digital agriculture. While buying crop solutions from online agro-inputs portals is normal in many leading agricultural-producing countries, it is still a new concept for Indian consumers. Though during the unprecedented times of Covid-19 the Indian agriculture sector moved a step ahead to adopt and gain from technology as agro-inputs e-commerce platforms and online shopping emerged as the most sustainable solution for suddenly-open-to tech Indian agrochemical retailers, distributors, and farmers but this was just the beginning,” says Vaman Alawadhi.
“Today when mobile phones and internet have reached even the rural interiors of the country we must promote the online buying and selling of agrochemical products and create the right platforms for it. This is the only way to remove the mediators and let the manufacturers and the buyers build a direct connection with each other. This in turn will reduce the cost of farming and will ensure better crop quality and higher yields as the farmers who are the end-users of these products will get the authentic and quality products at fair prices. This small step toward digital farming has the great capacity to change the face of Indian agriculture forever and AgFarm dreams to make it happen!” he added further.