Deadline: 18-Dec-22
Social Alpha is pleased to announce the launch of Krishi Mangal 2.0 Accelerator Program for innovators and entrepreneurs with transformative technologies that address a curated set of challenges faced by the smallholder farmers with a focus on sustainably empowering the agricultural ecosystem to increase farm incomes under climate variability.
Organisations with the potential to create impact, scale across locations and demonstrate business model sustainability are eligible to apply.
Krishi Mangal aims at making farm & allied livelihoods efficient, sustainable and climate resilient for the wellbeing of small & marginal farmers by bringing together the power of innovation, entrepreneurship, and communities.
Krishi Mangal is an 18-month Market Access and Scale-up Accelerator for 10 in-revenue start-ups working in agriculture & rural livelihoods with a focus on sustainably empowering the agricultural ecosystem to increase farm incomes under climate variabilities.
10 start-ups will receive a grant for field implementation and venture acceleration support such as marketing, go-to-market support, fundraising, technology refinement, and mentorship from Cisco experts.
Problem Areas
- Water – Soil – Crop Nexus for Climate Resilience
- Degraded soil conditions due to a combination of intensive mono cropping, overuse of chemical inputs, and polluted and exploited water resources are further increasing the vulnerability to climate risk.
- Allied Livelihoods for Resilience
- With crop-based incomes at the mercy of climate events, the allied sector can play an increased role in stabilizing the farm incomes. However, lack of productivity, and high risks in allied activities need innovations to make them profitable and thriving.
- Post-harvest Management for Climate Mitigation
- The effect of heat, humidity, early ripening, decay, pest attacks, physical damage lead to decrease in nutrient value, quality and shelf-life of the produce leading to food loss. Food loss caused due to absence of appropriate post-harvest solutions at farmgate leads to significant loss in income for farmers.
- Inability to find markets leads to further economic loss for farmers and causes food waste adversely impacting the climate with increased GHG emissions.
What is The Structure of the Program?
- The structure of the program consists of a 12 month on ground pilot implementation, which will commence as per the dates mentioned under the selection process;
- Selected start-ups will be introduced to the Social Alpha program team and respective Portfolio Managers will be allotted towards each of the start-ups, who will act as an advisor and help facilitate several opportunities across domains such as knowledge sessions, need assessment workshops, mentorship sessions, connections relating to incubation support etc. to ensure that the start-ups are able to utilize the 12 months adequately.
Program Offerings
- Market Access/Field Implementation – INR 42 Lakhs per start-up
- Access to 12-month field implementation to scale the solution
- Venture Acceleration Support – Up to INR 5 Lakhs per start-up
- Market Access – Access to Social Alpha’s strong implementation/grassroots partner and program network
- Dedicated Portfolio Management – Assistance with developing go-to-market strategy and overall business advisory for 1 year
- Fundraising support – Assistance with fundraising collaterals and other requirements; Access to Social Alpha’s large and diverse investor and donor network
- Marketing and Branding – Assistance with marketing collaterals, designing and other requirements
- Product Support – Assistance with product development, refinement, and design
- Networking Opportunity – Access to Cisco’s wide range of global and local partners
- Cisco Mentorship
- Mentor sessions with Cisco experts on Product refinement, HR strategy, Sales and GTM, Supply chain management, etc.
Who Should Apply?
The program is looking for in-revenue start-ups with innovative solutions fitting the following criteria:
- Start-ups should demonstrate innovation in their product/service, business model, or operating model and must align to the focus areas outlined in the program. Applicants using digital technology solutions to create value can also apply, given they can demonstrate tangible and direct impact of their intervention for small and marginal farmers.
- Start-ups applying should demonstrate market validation, have early traction/paying customers for their solution, and be ready to scale.
- Ideal applications are solutions that are at TRL 7 to the fully commercialized stage.
Eligibility Criteria
- Participating or proposed ventures should be independent entities, meaning that they should not be a subsidiary of an existing corporation or have legal ties to a government body;
- Existing non-profits can participate; however, they should propose a venturing idea or a plan to transform their existing solutions into a more sustainable solution;
- As the program is looking for start-ups to work on establishing marketing channels for existing products, and not research, only those with developed ideas and/or prototypes should apply;
- The applicant should be a registered company /willing to be registered in India. The shareholding by Indian promoters in the company should be at least 51%.
For more Information, visit Krishi Mangal 2.0 Accelerator Program.