Krishnaiah is the founder of Pasidi Panta, a company working with spice growers. Coming from an agricultural family, he has firsthand experience with the difficulties smallholder farmers face. In 2014 Krishnaiah did the unthinkable. He sold parts of his farmland to become an entrepreneur, despite the concerns of his family. He had a vision and the drive to start a business that could help smallholder farmers improve their profits.

Before setting out on his journey as an entrepreneur, Krishnaiah spent 16 years working with a range of different organizations from Government and NGOs, but they were all agriculture related. Through this experience, he realized the importance of entrepreneurship, technology, business strategy, sustainability, and inclusive development. 

Smallholder farmers often feel helpless when selling at the market. Traders might say that the quality of the farmers’ produce isn’t good and will undercut the sale. For example, if the market price is ₹14,000 they would quote ₹9,000, even when the produce is high quality. Before Pasidi Panta, farmers had no other option. Every season they felt exploited. Now, with Pasidi Panta’s transparent pricing and resources, these farmers can sell their “golden harvest” with dignity.

Upaya’s Program Associate, Aditi Das, sat down with Krishnaiah to learn more about how he is using his experience and expertise to help these agricultural communities thrive.

Q. What inspired you to start your Pasidi Panta?

I came from a humble agricultural family and had firsthand experience of the difficulties being faced by smallholder farmers. During my professional career, I got opportunities to work with farmers and agribusinesses; and realized that there are so many gaps and opportunities in Indian agriculture. That triggered a deep desire in me to build a large scale business enterprise that could impact the livelihoods of smallholder farmers. My experience in agriculture combined with the potential for business led me to start Pasidi Panta, an early stage company working with Spice growers at the moment.

Q. Have you faced any unique challenges being an entrepreneur? How did you deal (or are dealing) with them?

Yes, one of the challenges was to convince my family. In the year 2014, I tried to start a business in the fruits and vegetable space without any capital in hand and went to the extent of selling farm land. To my family, being from agriculture, selling land is like removing an organ from the body. Obviously, they resisted the idea of me leaving a comfortable corporate job and getting into my own business. Later, I had no other option than getting back to employment. It took almost five years for me to convince them and in the meantime I prepared myself for the long haul by developing necessary skills and a network.

Q. Why did you decide to formulate a business model with such a strong emphasis on social impact?  What is the large scale problem you’re looking to solve?

We are trying to address the problem of profitability for smallholder farmers who make up 85% of Indian farmers. One way to solve this is to improve access to quality inputs, agro advisory, finance, and market linkages for farmers. It’s equally important to adapt market driven production systems. We identified that pesticide residue is a major concern from a food safety perspective. Also given the climate change, it’s critical for us to improve soil health, conserve water, and improve biodiversity from a sustainability standpoint. Hence we started with a value chain approach. We work closely with farmers and other ecosystem partners. That’s how social and environmental impact became integral components of our operating model. Our business growth depends upon our ability to deliver real value for farmers on the supply side and processors on the demand side. Our strong interconnection between business and impact is something that we are very proud of as an organization.

Q. You work with a population that has a high concentration of people living in poverty. What have you witnessed on the ground?

Farming has become unviable and that’s the reason why, given a choice, even farmers don’t want to continue in agriculture. There are far too many variables that can affect the lives of farmers. As one famous saying goes, farmers are always just one drought or flood away from poverty.

Despite that, I find smallholder farmers very resilient and resourceful. Given support, they can do wonders. The pandemic has proved this and agriculture work became a fallback livelihood option even when all other industries failed. However, providing them with support in terms of finance, training, and consultation along with other institutional measures is critical to lift farmers out of poverty.

Q.  What role do you think your business plays in the lives of those you employ or impact?

With our work, we are able to ensure more income for farmers. With market linkage services alone, farmers are able to earn an additional income of ₹1500 - ₹2000 per quintal of Chili. This is equivalent to the income they earn from a paddy crop. With transparent weighment at farmgate and fair pricing, farmers felt empowered – which is quite the opposite to their experience selling at regular markets where they feel helpless, exploited, and cheated.  Through our Village Level Entrepreneur (VLE) and Farmer Producer Organization (FPO) model, we are able to improve confidence amongst farmers and help them earn through incentives. We are now planning to go beyond agriculture and rollout social security interventions like insurance for member farmers.

Q. Is there any particular story about a farmer that has really touched you or has inspired you to do more?

Shyamrao is one of the Village Level Entrepreneurs (VLE) who is a progressive smallholder farmer with around 2.2 acres. Within his land, he actually grows multiple crops so that even if one crop fails, the others will be there as a risk mitigation strategy. Shyamrao is very passionate about agriculture. KVK (Krishi Vigyan Kendras) are agricultural research stations where scientists conduct a lot of programs. Shyamrao ends up attending all the training programs at different KVKs. When he shared what he learned in the programs, unfortunately, no farmer would listen to him. For almost 20 years he is the only farmer trying new methods. He had been unable to convince the others to replicate what he was doing. 

When we entered the market we saw how resourceful, knowledgeable, and helpful Shyamrao was so we made him a VLE and started providing services through him. He began providing best quality seeds at affordable prices and micronutrient based soil applicators. He also played a key role in procurement as he ensured that almost 100 out of 105 farming families in his village supplied material to Pasidi Panta. Because of his dedication, we were able to get a better price realization for those farmers. 

The moment the other farmers saw him as a catalyst they started listening to him. He told me that before he used to farm on his own piece of land and used to share what he had learned, but nobody listened to him. Now since he is the Pasidi Panta focal point in his village, people respect him, which has increased his self respect. He said many farmers come to him first if they face any issue.

That's the kind of self respect and dignity that farmers are able to achieve by being part of what we are trying to do in the Chili value chain. This is one clear change in quality of life that I can see - somebody who wanted to educate others but was not able to influence them is now part of Pasidi Panta.

Q. What is your vision for your company? 

Our vision is to become an export oriented, vertically integrated, agricultural company focusing on high value commodities. As a country, India has a competitive advantage in spices where we are the largest producer, consumer, and exporter. We believe that such high value commodities can help smallholder farmers improve their income level. In parallel, we are working towards developing a farmer centric, technology driven, full-stack service delivery model to fulfill the diverse needs of farmers. Hopefully this model, once fully developed, shows a pathway to fix problems of smallholder driven farming, efficiently and effectively, in economies such as Asia and Africa.

Q. What are some of the key insights you’ve gained after working in this sector? Were there any ‘aha!’ or ‘oh no!’ moments?

Agriculture is a massive industry and each agro-commodity is a billion dollar opportunity. No single company can fulfill the diverse needs of farmers. So it makes sense for people with complementary business interests to collaborate. I think that a sense of collaboration is necessary, especially among agritech startups. Our partnerships with reputed companies, both on the input and output side of agriculture, have been helpful. We identified opportunities, leveraged synergies, and grew our businesses together with nine institutional partners. Each partnership is a kind of ‘aha!’ moment for us.

Q. What is a piece of advice you’d like to give to other aspiring entrepreneurs?

I realized that entrepreneurship is not for the weak-minded and it requires many sacrifices. Strong passion, self-confidence, a willingness to take risks, openness to learn, and ability to quickly grab opportunities are some of the qualities I have observed amongst successful entrepreneurs. So, my sincere advice to aspiring entrepreneurs is to reflect on these qualities and interact with people working in similar fields before venturing into entrepreneurship. If one is already working with an organization, my advice is to test the market on a small scale, maybe as a side hustle, before taking that bold decision of becoming an entrepreneur.

MEDIA CONTACT:

Madlin D’silva
mdsilva@upayasv.org