A cohesive ecosystem to support innovations for small and marginal landholding
Challenges such as water scarcity, soil fertility, pests and diseases, limited inputs, unfavourable policies, limited access or lack of markets as well as climate issues, plague the small and marginal landholdings at a higher intensity than others. In addition, many of these smaller units of land are commonly observed as unviable for agriculture and, therefore, unable to provide a sustainable livelihood for their owners.
Right from sowing, farm and labor management, and financial support to farm management, market consolidation, storage, and protection against losses or crisis, small and marginal farm holdings suffer innumerable issues while facing high transaction costs, lack of collective action, and coordination failure in production and marketing.
Need of the Hour
It is clear that with the sheer size of small and marginal landholdings in our country, the available options are not sufficient to address issues that haunt them. Innovative ideas, disruption in technology and practices, a user-centric approach to create sustainable solutions, and a more focused perspective towards these challenges are required at a larger scale.
Giving wings to agritech start-ups who are working on such solutions, Krishi Mangal, a flagship initiative of Cisco, in partnership with Social Alpha, brings together a robust ecosystem of partners that comprise domain experts, investors, government stakeholders, and start-ups to catalyse initiatives. Launched in 2021, the program to date has supported 12 start-ups committed to impacting the lives of more than 45,000 farmers and still counting.
«It's inspiring to witness how agritech startups are responding to current agricultural
