Super Chain Theme: Life of Indian Farmers In Lockdown What if we - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

Super Chain

Theme: Life of Indian Farmers In Lockdown

What if we are in a lockdown situation for more than a year? 17.05.2020 Pune, India

Adarsh G Industrial Designer

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Shashank Sahay Product Designer Kunal Jagtap UX Designer

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Chetan Patil Product Experience Designer

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Team Our mentor

Video: current scenario

Hear it from them

“In my 21 years as a farmer I have never faced a crisis like this”

says A. Suresh Kumar, a watermelon farmer in Chitharkadu village, Tamil Nadu.

Source: www.ruralindiaonline.org

“The only reason I’m agreeing to such bad offers is because I don’t want such good fruits to just rot away. This has already put me at a great loss.”

says M. Murugavel, 41, watermelon farmer in Kokkaranthangal village

Hear it from them

Source: www.ruralindiaonline.org

Ground Report

1000 cr

Loses of grape Farmers in Maharashtra

Data Points

1500 cr

Cumulative market yard loss in Andhra Pradesh

$1 billion

Farm produce industry facing losses

79%

Of fruits & vegetables sale dropped by March

55%

Agri and agri allied workers not working currently

50%

Reduction in per quintal rate of mangos

The problem that we are trying to solve

• For the farmer the loss incurred in this year’s harvest due to uncertain market demands and connectivity of

logistics, experiencing these uncertainties will deter her/him from attempting to grow produce for next year or cycle in his farm.

• This will result in a systemic collapse in the agriculture production for the coming year which can lead to a

national food shortage, unable to feed everyone in our country

Why is it an urgent problem?

Problem Identified

What is the impact we’re trying to achieve?

• To improve or increase the farmer’s access to trusted information, trusted input services and trustworthy and

a sustainable market.

• How might we improve the financial health of the farmers during these unprecedented times?
• How might we reduce the threat caused by this pandemic systemic breakdown to the financial stability of a

farmer?

Emergent Solutions

Personas

Rajaram Shinde 1.5 acre

Location - Talegaon Dabhade, (35 km away from city)

Ganesh Harak 3.5 acre

Location - Dhindori, Nashik (42 km away from city)

Hari K 9 acre

Location - Adaguru,Mysore (50.1 km away from city)

Ravi Awate 30 acre

Location - Baramati (106 km away from city)

Shanti Pillai 2.2 acre

Location -Belaguli, Tumkur (71 km away from city)

Primary school

Bio

Rajaram is a marginal farmer. Owns around 1.5 acres of land & chooses to grow mostly vegetables in 50% of land & one cash crop/fruit in the remaining 50%. He is the decision-maker of the house and farm. Rajaram is social & well connected in his community & is curious when learning about new farming methods from his peers. He has enormous tacit knowledge but lacks knowledge about the new

• development. His daughter uses a smartphone and usually helps him book a slot
• n government portals to sell his commodities. Aspires for his daughter to go to

college but equally worried about the future of his farm & commodities

Personality Traits

• Friendly
• Giving
• Responsible
• Sociable

Goals

• To ensure quality education of his children
• Instill a safe and happy environment for his family and

community

Drops his children to school & goes to farm Monitor crop health & performs tasks as per the stage of crop cycle Attends village gatherings/meetings/discussions Reads newspaper & posts in Whatsapp about farming related issues

• 1. Struggles to find correct

price/information for commodities

• 2. Multiple arrangements & phone calls

to take his commodities to market

• 3. Financial planning for the next crop

cycle which is heavily dependent upon the current status of the crop sales

COVID-19 effect

• 4. Due to the current crisis, he’s not sure

where to take his produce as the market is closed and that’s the only

• ption the farmer knows about.
• 5. With this crisis, it makes him worry about

the future and his farm’s future

“When I face problems in crops, my daughter helps me using her smartphone, I do not know how to use

• ne”

Rajaram Shinde, 45, Maharashtra, India

Daily Activities Frustrations

B.Sc Agri

Bio

Hari studied B.Sc agriculture from National University. He works on a farm with his

• father. Their main commodity is grapes and papaya, the secondary commodity is
• veggies. He is always open to new technologies, trends & models to try and

implement in his farm & always looks for collaboration to get the best of price & reach maximum consumers. Fairly tech-savvy & aspires to upgrade to latest phone and internet plans. He often tries to experiment with the crops & tries to pitch them to nearby FPO & factories to get reviews. He loves spending quality time watching movies, keeping updated about current scenario (health, food & money) & watching youtube videos

Personality Traits

• Moody
• Curious
• Outgoing
• Enthusiastic

Goals

• To get recognised as a role model amongst his friends and community
• Implement innovation in traditional methods being followed
• To become independent for the sales of his commodities

Daily Activities

Attend remote meeting/exhibitions with his father and friends Buys new equipment and gadgets frequently Studying different business models and

• pportunity areas

Video calls with friends and family

Frustrations

• 1. Struggles to manage things independently
• 2. Constant worry about uncertainties of weather

and other factors impacting their income and health of crops

• 3. Not being able to get ontime information & test

results of his small experiments

• 4. In current crisis, he’s finding other

ways to sell his produce and reaching to Consumers directly on social media

• 5. He finds it tough to educate or making the the

farmer community aware on how to sail through the current crisis and also convincing them to sell their produce as a community

“I want to make my parents and community proud by bringing innovation in agricultural processes”

Hari K, 29 Karnataka, India

COVID - 19 effect

12th Pass

Bio

Ganesh is a marginal flower farmer who owns one TATA pickup. He uses this vehicle to transport his flower commodities to the market. TATA pickup is his secondary source of income as he uses it to transport labors, and commodities of

• ther farmers till market. Uses a smartphone and posts his market trip schedules
• n Whatsapp group where other fellow farmers join him according to their

harvest’s quantity. He does not prefer taking out his vehicle unless it’s 70% full. For him, today farming business is a total loss as his major earnings go into buying fertilizers, seeds, labour, etc and does not earn much profit for the next cycle. He has attempted to sell his goods directly to consumers but has not succeeded significantly because of no proper information & planning

Personality Traits

• Planner
• Extrovert
• Family Oriented

Goals

• To utilize his vehicle capacity efficiently
• To be a good family head who is fulfilling the needs of his family on time
• To buy another piece of land and grow organic fruits

Call /post updates to multiple farmers before going to market Schedule visits of FPO officials to his farm collaborate with them. Gets farm related materials (tools, fertilizers, etc) from city to his village Enquire the availability of

• ther farm

Equipments from the nearby villages

• 1. No business to his vehicle in land

preparation season

• 2. Struggles to deal with EMI of the agri

loan

• 3. Struggles to reach market on time due

to collection of commodities of fellow farmers

• 4. Struggles to sell to direct consumers

and earn more profit

COVID-19 effect

• 5. With the markets closed due to the

current crisis, the pickup lies idle.

• 6. His flower produce is being dumped as

there is no market demand for flowers

“I’ve worked hard all my life to enable my children to get quality education so that they can lead a better life ”

Ganesh Harak, 38 Maharashtra, India

Daily Activities Frustrations

B.Sc Agri

Bio

He is well-reputed, looked upto & influential in his community. He has been very successful in trying & implementing new irrigation techniques & models on his

• farm. He is in constant search for collaborations & looking for a medium to share

his life events at his farm. He likes documenting his farm & farm-related activities

• n various social platforms to broaden his reach. He wants the peers & current

generation to follow his methods for various problems & ideas. He is looking for a safe environment where he can collaborate & share & post anything without getting

• intimidating. His aim is to showcase & prove that agriculture is a pursuable & safe

career option for today’s generation

Personality Traits

• Leader
• Innovative
• Supportive
• Caring

Goals

• To pass on his farming experiments and uplift the farming community
• To make current agriculture model scalable, structured & safe
• Educate upcoming farmers with new and updated information

Meets different people (villagers, local gov.

• fficials, investors) on various agendas

Inspects the status of his crop growth & experiments Keeping updated with nationwide scenarios Using Whatsapp & Facebook messenger for all his updates and interacting with friends and family

Frustrations

1.Young generations moving out of village and selling their lands 2.Farmers struggling and still using traditional models for farming and selling 3.Not able to reach desired number of people & help them earn right price 4.Fellow farmers getting cheated and not earning the fair price for their crops

COVID-19 effects

• 5. In this crisis where social

distancing is a must due to which people have spread out he is finding it difficult to find help to harvest his produce

• 6. He finds it tough to alleviate the fear about

the virus and misconceptions among his fellow and how fast misinformation spreads

“I wish to make my village a model village in farming, using scientific methodologies and technology ”

Ravi Awate, 58 Maharashtra, India

Daily Activities

Secondary school

Bio

Shanti is the head of her household and mother of two. She plant beans, peanuts, sweet potatoes & other vegetables in her 2.2-acre land. Her husband committed suicide 4 years back due to the overburden of a bank loan which he couldn’t

• payback. The older son helps her in farm & younger son goes to school. She is
• ne of the few women who are fearless & believes that she will bring things on

track for her family. She is dependent upon various people (vehicle service providers, equipment providers, bank, etc) for the farming tasks, & equally helps whoever is in need.

Personality Traits

• Hardworking
• Welcoming
• Fearless

Goals

• To expand her farming operations (in size or diversity of crops)
• To make her children's future financially safe

She gathers water every morning and returns back home to cook meal Sends her younger son to school When she is not farming, she socializes and enjoys gossip She sells some of the produce locally on the highway

• 1. Unseasonal rains and unfavorable weather

conditions, affecting her produce

• 2. Not having access to information or training in

new farming methods and techniques

• 3. Unable to get right price for her produce in the

markets

COVID-19 effects

• 4. She could not sell her harvest this season

due to the lockdown, she does not have enough money to buy seeds and fertilizers for her next cycle of crops.

• 5. She is having to rethink how she’s going to

survive this pandemic.

“Though my husband left us but I’ll make sure I run the farm like he did & have a better future to my children ”

Shanti Pillai, 35 Karnataka, India

Daily Activities Frustrations

Exploration & synthesis

We decided to narrow down our focus on help solve the wicked problem for flower farmers since they are the most affected during this pandemic (due to zero demand of flowers) and the future revival of this sector during the pandemic looks bleak.

Brightly coloured roses, chrysanthemums, lilies, marigold and other flowers that might normally have been destined for marriage decoration and temples -- are now being destroyed by growers in unprecedented manner as the rapidly spreading coronavirus brings demand to a standstill.

Ground Report

• Flower farmers are most affected in the pandemic, due to the low shelf/storage life of flowers and the lack of demand

(marriages, temples, exports and other celebrations closed)

• These flowers can be harvested and the community can plan some small scale business activities with the produce such as

gulkan, craft objects etc

• Most of the flower farmers are razing their crops and planning to change their produce to other plants or veggies with little

knowledge on how to grow them.

Insights

• Considering the pandemic is going to last for around a year, large celebrations and gatherings are going to be avoided for a

while, the future demand forecast of flower produce looks bleak.

• The predictions of huge economy crash is further going to slow down consumption of flowers as it is not a necessity with a

high possibility of food crisis, it is best advised for flower farmers to shift to food crops.

Future Shock

A service which provides farmers with instant relief solutions and long term plan to make their future financially secure.

Our Solution

Intelligent Crop Recommendations, Sell and Learn

Connect farmers directly to people who are buying flowers:

• 1. Paper makers
• 2. Perfumers
• 3. Greeting cards
• 4. Small Celebrations

Intelligent recommendation

• f alternative food crops to grow for

flower farmers, based on data model + domain expert human suggestions.

Learning:

Knowledge portal

Access to verified information about processing flowers into

• ther commodities and

information related to growing of food crops

Verified Learning information

• 1. Post processing of flowers

into other articles which can be stored

• 2. Growing food crops

What the service will deliver?

Recommend:

Long term scenario

Empowering the farmer survive the pandemic by providing intelligent crop recommendation shifting to food crops instead of flowers in the pandemic

Sell:

Instant Relief

Helping flower farmers directly sell already harvested produce

Mode of service delivery

Mobile Application and a Whatsapp Helpline:

• 1. The application is multi-lingual and easy to use with tap friendly conversational UI.
• 2. Mobile application plays the major role reaching out to younger demographic,

(COVID-19 has increased reverse migration)

• 3. The SmartPhone sensors combined with the application enables us to gather better

information, which helps us provide better service

• 4. People who are unable to download and use the application can also reach us via

Whatsapp, enables wider reach for the service.

Data set from markets Data set from agriculture universities Input from farmers like, soil type, past history

• f crops grown, water

availability, land etc

Simplified representation of recommendation engine

Domain expert Recommendation model Intelligent food crop recommendation to grow in the next cycle

Innovation

Technological breakthroughs in Machine learning and Artificial intelligence help us provide Intelligent crop recommendation for the user’s next cycle/season of crop, providing tailored recommendation specific to the user.

Video: Solution

Understanding & Empathise Synthesis & Insights Ideation Prototype

Gathering information about farmers distress due to COVID-19 from

• 1. Newspapers
• 2. Video reports
• 3. Documents
• 4. Conversations with

domain experts Creating Indian farmer personas Figuring out the root cause of the systemic collapse? What kind of farmers have been affected the most. Who will remain vulnerable in the future? How might we usher farmers in financial distress into financial stability/security? Building a mobile app with conversational UI which is easy to use and enables farmers to sell their produce directly, get intelligent crop recommendations for next crop cycle and has a knowledge portal to learn.

Execution & viability

• 1. Identification of user groups for testing & pilots (collaboration with FPOs, SHGs, NGOs,

CSR division, etc)

• 2. Identify village cluster for MVP release/implementation
• 3. Tapping the influencers’ ecosystem/group to show impact to the community (Identify

modal/early adopters group by co-creation workshop)

• 4. Analyse results and sales trend for in such cluster
• 5. Collaborate with FPOs, SHGs, CSR divisions, agri institutes to extend the reach of the service

and onboard the farmers and information providers

Envisioned Impact

As of 2015 - 16 India has about 2,49,000 hectares area under cultivation in floriculture If we reach about 50% of those farmers & enable them to grow food crops, We can prevent the plight of lakhs of people by creating more consumable food in the market & helping farmers adapt & thrive in the current condition.

Thank you

Intelligent Crop Recommendations, Sell and Learn