Farm success tied to factory model

Indian farms would need to increasingly move to factory-like operation to continue serving the changing needs of consumers, said a panel on AgriTech at the Global Entrepreneurship Summit. Technology would have to play a bigger role, said the speakers in Hyderabad on Wednesday.
 
Agriculture output depends on weather and quality can be heterogeneous. In factory, you control output, shape, size and quality. Farming can also move towards this direction, S Sivakumar, chief executive of ITC’s agribusiness division, explained.
 
Sivakumar said agriculture would have to balance the interests of consumers and farmers while addressing the challenges of resources. “The consumer wants nutritious and safe food at reasonable prices while higher income is the aspiration of farmers. Farmers’ average income is just one-fourth of the average per capita income in developing countries. We also need some dignity for farm labour so that the next generation is interested in farming. A better quality of life in villages is the need of the hour,” said Sivakumar, whose company deals with six million farmers growing crops such as wheat, soybean and tobacco in 22 states. These feed into the company’s FMCG business and also cater to the requirement of other small and large end-users in domestic and overseas markets.

 
Maxim Pasik, executive chairman of WaterGen, an Israeli company, said farmers can grow anything from corn to wheat to rice on vertical walls that don’t require big land parcels.