Helping a startup farmer to improve Iran’s agricultural industry!

One of the problems that have always troubled farmers is not having enough knowledge for farming, in other words, not having enough training. This lack of training in some cases, such as pest attacks, sometimes makes the farmer face many problems.

Sometimes in these cases, it has been observed that with the wrong guidance of some unknown people such as poison sellers, the consequences of these pests have increased. On the other hand, some government structures have been set up to help and advise farmers, but due to the bare structure and the impossibility of nationwide coverage in time, there is practically no help for farmers.

In these conditions Startup There have been some to help correct this situation, one of them is Emdad Keshavarz startup. This startup, which has good experience in this field, has developed an application for this purpose and is developing the services provided by its application. We talked to Yusuf Biarsh, the CEO of this startup, to introduce us to this business:

introduce yourself.

My name is Yusuf Biarash, a master of MBA from Allameh Tabatabai University. A professional team with different specialties is present in Emdad Shavarz; I also work as the managing director of Emdad Keshavarz, as a trade and business specialist. In the farmer’s aid team, there are people who either worked in the field of agriculture or are currently working. In addition, we have several senior agricultural experts from Tehran University in our team.

Why did you enter this field? And in what year did you launch the application?

We noticed the problems in this area since 1994, and almost all problems were caused by the lack of agricultural technical knowledge among farmers, especially traditional farmers, which can be said to lead to a decline in productivity in this sector. Although 18% of the labor force in our country is active in this field, only 9% of the country’s gross production is agriculture, which in my opinion, this percentage can be improved.

To solve this problem, we launched various systems, including call center and USSD systems, but they did not work. Then it was from 1994 that we started the feasibility studies of Farmer’s Aid, and from 1996 we developed the Farmer’s Aid Android software, which lasted for a year. took

How is the provision of farmer assistance service?

Business The main aid to the farmer is free advice to the farmer; In such a way that whenever the farmer encounters a problem through the application (due to the farmer’s lack of access to the Internet), he can solve his problem by contacting the farmer’s assistance advisors. In another service, farmers can take photos or videos of their problems and send them to advisors.

In our opinion, “education” was a missing link in the supply chain of the agricultural sector, which Emdad-Kashwarz also aimed to find. Since 1997, we have won many honors, including: being chosen as Cafe Bazar’s preferred application for 3 times and also being recognized as the most creative Cafe Bazar application. Currently, Emdad Keshavarz is known as the most popular application in this field with more than 20,000 users.

We also provide other main services, such as the “Sabze Maidon” service, which helps the farmer to eliminate middlemen, and is a kind of direct supply and demand market in this area, and is considered a kind of marketplace, with the difference that we also deal with other issues such as It supports the lease of land for contract farming, etc.

Another service that was launched from farmers’ feedback is the “Question and Answer” service in order to make farmers aware of each other’s problems. Experts and other farmers can answer the questions presented in this service. Some of the farmers’ questions are related to getting a license, and in this regard, cooperation with the Jihad organization in introducing government services will greatly help speed up this process.

The “agricultural locator” service shows public and private organizations and even fertilizer shops, poison shops, etc. around farmers’ locations.

The “Relief Camera” service allows farmers to interact with each other so that they can take videos of their successes and send them to us, and we will present them in the application.

The next service is the “guaranteed purchase of wheat” that we made through the memorandum of understanding with the specialized mother company of state trading, farmers can request the guaranteed purchase of the country’s state merchants from the application with their national code and be aware of the price drop or increase information. .

The last service is “educational materials” in which experts with scientific and technical knowledge support our service.

How many people do the farmer relief team consist of?

8 people.

Are there any successful foreign and domestic examples in this field? Is it possible for these competitors to enter Iran?

There are many successful foreign examples in this field. The examples that I have in mind right now are AgroStar in India and AgriSync in America, both of which have somehow implemented a part of our platform. In fact, the green revolution that happened in India’s agricultural industry was also the result of the expansion of education in this field, and by following this path, we can help the production and economy of our country.

I don’t think these samples have the conditions to enter Iran, but if they do, we have tried to provide a comprehensive platform to solve the needs of farmers in general and there is no need for another platform.

Inside the country, we have two similar examples but at a weaker level, which are not active in the field of education but in the field of agricultural applications; One is a large agricultural market and the other is online agriculture.

Is there a guarantee in farmer aid consultations?

We have all the information of the farmers’ aid experts, and on the other hand, a human force examines the questions asked from the farmers’ aid and reviews the feedbacks resulting from this interaction, and asks the farmers to solve their problems; In this regard, if we can get the approval of the Ministry of Jihad for the farmers relief experts, then we can pursue these problems legally.

What is the income model of farmer relief?

We have about 100 experts who are divided into the fields available in the application. At first, our main business was based on a free service to gain the trust of users, but we also provided services to earn money; Among these services: getting an annual subscription to the “Mekan Keshavarz” service from private organizations, and the other is the “Amdad Market” service, which is a store for suppliers and producers of agricultural inputs, such as: fertilizers, poisons, seeds, agricultural equipment, greenhouses and … in this regard, we have reached an understanding with various companies to sell their products on our platform and we receive a fee in the meantime.

Our third revenue model is selling professional educational content to farmers. We are also concluding a memorandum of understanding with the Agricultural Insurance Fund so that farmers can inquire about the amount of their insurance fine with their nationality and date of birth.

Have you ever had a fundraising or acceleration process? Idea

We did not have an accelerated process, but a percentage of the farmer’s aid in return Fundraising We have offered it and to continue the marketing work, we need to attract new capital.

What challenges did you face along the way?

One of the biggest challenges was managing the activities of the experts, whether they are doing their answers correctly or not. In this regard, we even moved towards automatic control in the form of machine learning, but no method other than using human resources was the answer; Because in this way, sometimes farmers called “Ambassadors of Farmer’s Aid” have also helped us in introducing Farmer’s Aid to others.

In addition to that, we presented a campaign called “Keshavarzzadegan” so that farmers can provide information in this field from their experiences, and we are still receiving feedback so that farmers can find their true position in Iran.

If you could go back to the beginning, what would you do and what would you avoid doing?

From the beginning, I focused on the application and website and did not go to the call center, and I established more interaction with Iranian agricultural universities so that the professors of this field could also provide their information in this field.

Are you in a situation where you are thinking about folding your business?

Yes, because at first we had no income and it was very difficult to continue the path under these conditions, but the interest in the entrepreneurial space helped me to continue my path.

What advice do you have for startups interested in entering the agricultural industry?

The most important advice I have is to know the user, so as to gain the trust of farmers in the right way. Many farmers who are active in the final product field need a good supplier, but if there is no trust, this path will never be possible, and in my opinion, the farmers of our country only need to receive honesty from you in order to do business with accompany you