In agriculture today, the management of the value chain - from cultivation to consumption, from farm to fork - is fragmented. It is fragmented in terms of the science that is being understood and subsequently the way with which it is managed by different stakeholders. In the last 50 years, over enthusiasm in promoting individual domain expertise has resulted in the breakdown of the value chain into many small components, and each component despite being linked with others is pursued independently. As a result, today, Value Chain Management in agriculture is nobody’s domain.
Value Chain Management
The many ills affecting agriculture today is due to this approach. Food is being produced, collected and harvested in isolation from how it is processed, stored, packed, sold, served and also consumed. Most quality issues concerning food like contamination, adulteration, nutrition and safety, are a result of this fragmentation. Another significant issue of the current scenario is the disproportionate share of consumer spending which is distributed to different players in the food value chain. In most cases, the producer share is always less when compared to the processor, marketing agency and retailer’s share. This has not only been eroding the productive capacities of natural resources on which food production is dependant, but also the livelihood of those who produce food.
Organic agriculture being holistic in concept, management and certification addresses all issues concerning the food value chain. Morarka organic has therefore spent the last 15 years investing in solutions which address issues concerning various components of the food value chain. The outcome of its investments have been spectacular, and in many cases overwhelming. Through better management of natural resources at the farm level, it was possible to reduce the overall cost of cultivation. Efficient procurement after primary processing from the farm itself, innovative scientific methods of storage, entrepreneurial involvement in decentralized processing, appropriate packaging solutions and better deals from the retailers, have also contributed in reducing the final price of certified organic products to the consumers.
Thus there has been an increase in the overall size of the organic market. Furthermore, bringing in the efficiencies of scale benefited producers as well as the consumers of organic food. The ultimate goal for any agriculture development initiative is thus easily achieved with adoption of organic management philosophy and the value chain management approach.
Since organic certification is process based, it relies on monitoring of the complete process from production to consumption. Thus it almost makes it a prerequisite to set up an efficient value chain management system.
As compared to many advanced economies, where food production is fairly industrialized and thus better organized, in India it has still not evolved in the desired manner. The food value chain is still dominated by preferences for fresh food. Very little investment has gone into creating capacities for bulk and industrialized processing.
Organic consumers being better educated, more aware and well evolved, have been placing equal demands on both raw/fresh produce as well as processed food products. However due to negligible infrastructure, there existed a complete vacuum when Morarka Organic began.
Morarka Organic has therefore invested in developing solutions. Besides breakthroughs in technology, equipments and methods, its business model involving grass root level entrepreneurs is an example of Morarka Organic’s ability in value chain management and organic agriculture. These entrepreneurs today handle over 100 farm crops in decentralized locations and deliver 300 organic products on the retail shelf for consumers. As of today, this initiative supports over 100,000 small producers cultivating over 250,000 acres of organic land. With this experience Morarka Organic has thus become the true resource organization for organic value chain management not only in India but across the world.
Product Basket
More than 100 project locations, 100000 farmers and over 10 years in this sector and still growing strong every day has enabled Morarka to gain experiences in handling over 300 different agriculture products at farm level by now. As value chain management solutions, over 100 crops have been understood fairly well by us. About 60-70 products currently qualify to be part of our core portfolio and are offered to the trade in reasonable volumes. However, we are still not handling all the quantities that get produced as organic at farm level. As we are progressing in our efforts to establish marketing linkages, we are not only expanding the portfolio on offer, we are every year also increasing the quantities by many times every crop season. The current portfolio on offer is broadly categorized as follows:
1.
Cereals, Pulses, Beans & Sugar
2.
Spices, Condiments & Processed Herbs
3.
Oilseeds, Edible Oils & Clarified Butter (Ghee), Tea and Milk Products
4.
Fruits, Nuts & Dry Fruits
5.
Fresh Vegetables
6.
Cotton & Textile Products
7.
Lifestyle Products
8.
Other Processed Food Products
9.
Organic Agriculture Inputs
10.
Miscellaneous Non Food Products