In the age of corporatization and commercialization, agriculture is one sector that truly finds itself struggling. The majority of Indian farmers are small and marginal, who are not educated enough to understand prevailing market trends so as to plan their agricultural calendar and earn reasonable profits. While we find many agri-platforms online, what farmers need is a hybrid model, that can help farmers with certain on-ground measures such as last-mile connectivity, agri-warehousing, etc. Agribazaar identifying the needs of farmers to its finer details is serving digital and physical services leveraging advanced technologies like data analytics, artificial intelligence, and machine learning. Analytics Insight has engaged in an exclusive interview with Amith Agarwal, CEO & Co-Founder, AgriBazaar.

1. Kindly brief us about the company, its specialization, and the services that your company offers.

Agribazaar is India's first and leading online Agri platform, India's private electronic mandi (e – mandi). The online platform helps buyers and sellers (farmers) to come together in a mutually beneficial manner. From fair price discovery to trust-led dealings to quality assurance, the platform offers peace of mind to the participants.

2. With what mission and objectives, the company was set up? In short, tell us about your journey since the inception of the company.

The main objective of the company is to empower farmers by delivering efficiency, transparency, and traceability in the Agri value chain through technology. With over 1 lakh users, 33,000 listed auctions, and over INR 14000 crore GMV as of June 2020 on our digital platform, we're disrupting conventional agri-trading. Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML), Big Data, the Internet of Things (IoT), and drones are the tools in our mission.

In 2016, we started by building an online platform to connect farmers, traders, banks, enterprises, and governments. In 2017, we created an award-winning wallet – AgriPay – that has facilitated transactions of over $1 billion. Today, we're leveraging AI-driven insights and analytics to offer customized credit-on-a-click, crop advisory, and more.

3. What does your technology and business roadmap look like for the rest of the year?

We are progressing towards onboarding 1 crore farmers on our platform and our business roadmap for the year is moving towards that goal. With digitization becoming a key advantage, we hope to empower small Indian farmers with better price realization, and farm advisory and ensure presence across the value chain.

4. What is the edge your company has over other players in the industry?

Our biggest edge is agribazaar's physical model; with this, we can onboard farmers online and also offer them last-mile connectivity support like agri warehousing & logistics, agri-finance, seed & soil nutrient inputs, and crop intelligence.

5. What is the reason that organizations are using IoT/analytics/big data/AI/ML/Big Data Analytics?

Indian farm holdings are small and scattered; hence, by using deep technology like AI, big data, ML, etc. change for the better can be implemented at the mass scale. At agribazaar, we are geo-tagging farms so that the entire history, crop patterns, soil behavior, etc. is captured and a predictive high yield led plan is implemented custom-made to each farmer.

6. Where do you see growth coming in for the sector?

With more farmers getting online, digital sales and trade will be key growth areas for the Agri sector.

7. Mention some of the awards, achievements, recognitions, and clients' feedback that you feel are notable and valuable for the company.

The agribazaar has the award-winning e-wallet — AgriPay — that has facilitated transactions of over $1 billion so far.