IDH Farmfit fund recently invested in Stellapps Technologies, its first-ever investment in India. The investment marks the start of a unique collaboration of the IDH Farmfit Fund, the catalysing smallholder finance facility of IDH, and Stellapps, an end-to-end dairy technology solutions company.
Agriculture is the heart of the Indian economy. The dairy sector is its aorta, as it employs over 40% of the Indian agri-workforce and is the most significant contributor to India’s agricultural GDP. The Indian dairy sector is the largest globally, contributing 22% of the global milk production. The Indian dairy and livestock sector is a $225 billion industry and contributes to 7.6% of India’s GDP. Stellapps is challenging the status quo of India’s dairy ecosystem through its tech first, platform-based dairy supply chain services. The increasing milk demand and the huge untapped potential for milk supply form sufficient opportunities for continuous growth for Stellapps.
Impact
Stellapps expects to increase farmer net income by improving productivity in the value chain, enhancing milk quality, and enabling traceability. Stellapps aims to create a digital highway and an access network to deliver value-added services like credit, insurance, extension, agri-inputs.
Women constitute 83% of dairy farmers in India. Stellapps has committed to developing a gender strategy to promote female leadership throughout the dairy value chain while expanding its outreach in India.
Ranjith Mukundan, chief executive officer at Stellapps, said, “We are immensely happy to welcome IDH FarmFit fund with its first-ever equity investment in India. The investment will go towards building out our vision of creating a digital ecosystem that enables smallholder farmers to become entrepreneurs. This involves enabling easy and timely access to extension services, quality cattle nutrition, financial services, premium market linkage and other agri input services.
We look forward to learning from the rich experience of IDH Farmfit fund to drive a significant impact in the Indian agri sector.
Varishna Tewarie, the IDH Farmfit fund’s investment manager for Asia, said, “We are delighted to support Stellapps with this new investment, which will improve farmer income and positively impact their lives. We shall witness the transformation of one of India’s most crucial agricultural sectors. The company supports smallholder Indian farmers by increasing transparency, improving farming practices and enabling financial inclusion.
