Tending The Roots

LivLush is helping farmers by integrating them into the organised B2B Supply Chain

- Himanshu Kakkar

It is far better to sell to companies like LivLush than at the man-di (farmer market). Not only are the margins better, but payments are prompt, too,” says Kiran Kumar as he walks through his farm where he grows a variety of vegetables. One can see a swathe covered with a crop of leafy lettuce, with lemongrass plants dotting the boundaries. Kumar’s farms are located in Kattanallur village, not very far from Bengaluru city. He has been regularly selling vegetables to LivLush (formerly GreenAgTech), a Bengaluru-based startup, which is working towards professionalising the post-harvest supply chain.

Co-founder Rohan Patnaik feels the current supply chain that starts with the farm up until the end-consumer is extremely unstructured with the farmer’s own interests being compromised. Patnaik explains with the help of an example. “Let us assume that a farmer sells one kind of vegetable for ₹20 for a kg to the mandi. The middleman would sell it at ₹70 to the retailer, who then sells it to the end-consumer at ₹100. The middlemen’s margin comes up to ₹50 in this case. On the other hand, we would buy the same at ₹30 from the farmer, which means he makes 50% more, and we sell at a cheaper price to the endcustomer,” he says.

The intermediary cornering margins in the farm-to-fork supply chain has been a well-known phenomenon. The need to address this pain point was felt by Patnaik and his two cofounders B Raghunandan and Amol Patil in early 2016.

ACCIDENTAL STARTUP