Nepal is blessed with rich agro-climatic conditions and it produces a diverse set of agricultural produce. It has the potential to be the world's top producers in most of the major crops, herbs, fruits and vegetables. However, the present agriculture data represents to be the lowest in the world in terms of production and productivity. The potential of Nepalese agribusiness is simply huge if the bottlenecks are addressed.
Thus, R&D; Innovative Solution has been in operation since 2012, aiming to address the challenges faced by farming communities of Nepal. The company has been working in a soil to sale model, addressing the problems in every components of agriculture value chain.
To create economic opportunity among the farming communities of Nepal by converting low profitable traditional agriculture occupation into sustainable inter-connected entrepreneurial venture.
To strengthen the capacity of existing farmers or new entrants in the farming industry in order to turn their venture into a successful entrepreneurship.
The company has been publishing the largest circulated agriculture magazine ( Krishak ra Prabidhi) in Nepal. The magazine covers the wider range of agriculture information regarding government policies, farming techniques, market, latest technologies and other related information. The magazine is subscription based and is circulated around the nation with a readership base of more than 100K. It acts as a bridge between the farming community and the agriculture policy makers. The company has rolled out website, android based mobile based application, and even connecting with farmers through various social media platforms.
For reference Agrinepal.com
The company has been working in the ecommerce platform for the agriculture inputs supply as well as market linkage for the agriculture commodities. The e-commerce platform serves the entire value chain from input supply to product aggregation. Prior experience of running agriculture products retails outlets, agri centers and farmers market has helped to build the platform as per the need of the farmers as well as consumers. We are the first and only one e-commerce platform dedicated for the agriculture sector. The primary domain of this venture is to digitize the agricultural system in Nepal to create big data incorporating agriculture, livestock and poultry sector to increase productivity and market access. It functions in close cooperation with AgriCenter established in rural areas of Nepal. The company has a plan to roll out the android as well as IOS version of the platform very soon.
For reference Agrinepal.com
Despite of subsidized interest agriculture financing program brought by government of Nepal in its financial policy in 2014, its still limited to a handful of people only. As per central bank data, by mid Oct 2019, only 18,805 borrowers has access to the subsidized agriculture loan. In a country with the population of 28 million, and with more than 60% of people engaged in agriculture for their livelihoods it’s a miserable situation. Regarding this scenario, this initiative has designed and implemented a very innovative model to provide access to finance, business development services and extension services harnessing the digital potential in partnership with various stakeholders. The initiative will access the capital needed for the individual farming families in co-operation with local government agencies, and needed credit will be disbursed through a QR code card which can be accessed only with the merchants/vendors which supplies agriculture inputs. This controlled flow of credit restricts farmers using the loan amount except for the agriculture purpose. It ensures, inflow of credit for the stated purpose and further generates a huge chunk of data which helps to deliver other value added services to small holding farming farmers. We are the first organization in Nepal to rollout the Farmers Credit Card system in cooperation with financial institutions of Nepal.
For reference Agrinepal.com
Post Harvest Loss in fresh produce accounts for a 40% loss in Nepal. Fungus contamination of dry products due to improper storage is also at an alarming stage. In order to address these challenges R & D has been working in Cold Chain Management as well as Dry Chain Management services in Nepal. It has introduced the revolutionary CoolBot Technology developed by Store It Cold, USA.(www.storeitcold.com)and low-cost dry chain management services in Nepal, which can be developed by farmers themselves. The Post Harvest Department of the company is working in close cooperation with Horticulture Innovation Lab, UC DAVIS, for developing low-cost chimney solar dryers and Dry cards. So, far the organization has constructed more than 100 cold storage systems ranging from a storage capacity of 3 MT to 100 MT. We are the pioneer in introducing the latest technologies to address the challenges in Post Harvest Loss of horticulture crops. The company provides its services in the effective management of commodities in cold storage as well as training to the cold storage operators.www.coldstorenepal.com
