The Land Accelerator South Asia 2021 | Working with Small-Holder Farmers: Opportunities and Scope

The business models of many land restoration entrepreneurs rely on effectively engaging with smallholder farmers. It is essential to organize them to participate in the supply chain, and to empower them to participate in land-restoring, sustainable or organic farming and production methods. Other land restoration entrepreneurs may be providing inputs or services that will benefit the farmers in their quest for sustainable income generation. The speakers in this session will share lessons learned and experiences in engaging with thousands of farmers, working with different producer organisations (FPOs) and discuss strategies that can work for Land Restoration Entrepreneurs.

SPEAKERS

Sridhar Easwaran, Founding Member and Senior Vice President, FPO Institution Development, Samunnati Financial Intermediation & Services Private Limited

With 35 years of experience across operations, project management and risk management in the banking industry, Sridhar has worked at Pricewaterhouse Coopers and HDFC Bank. As the Senior Vice President of FPOs at Samunnati, he leads capacity development building for FPOs aligned to Samunnati’s AMLA approach. The capacity development team focuses on market linkages, access to finance, technology and advisory aspects.

Tarun Katoch, Head, Value Chainn, Dvara E-Registry

Tarun is the Head of Value Chain at Dvara E-registry where he leads the team working on connecting farmers and constituent stakeholders of the agri value chain through E-registry's tech-platform. Tarun has nearly a decade of experience in agriculture and trade markets. He started his career with developing supply chain in perishable commodities. Going forward, he worked with commodity exchange in different roles like business development, product manager and developing over the counter (OTC) trading platforms. Later, he moved into trading and worked as a merchant trader trading in agri commodities. He has extensive experience working with farmers and other value chain participants from across the country.

Gunajit Brahma, Founder, Jeev Anksh Eco Products Pvt. Ltd.

Gunajit is a National Award winning Social Entrepreneur (2016-17), by MSDE, Govt. Of India), Environmental activist, Writer, Poet, Social Worker and a EV owner. He is presently working as Director, Jeev Anksh Eco Products Pvt. Ltd. Jeev Anksh provides market linkages to over 10,000 farmers of organic and indigenous products in Northeast India, fetching them better returns and international market access. The team also manages a 1000-hectare organic farm of its own. Featured products include Black Rice, Red Rice, Aromatic Joha Rice, Turmeric, Ginger, King chili, Black Pepper, and Sichuan Pepper. He is also Director, Farmeasy Technologies Pvt. Ltd. focused at Financial inclusion of small farmers. Previously he was partner at RenewableBazaar and holds a PGDM from IIM Indore (2010-12).