Access Livelihoods Foundation

Team Leader

Veeresh h

Solution Overview

Solution Name:

One-line solution summary:

A Data-driven mobile application to Scale Rural Household Poultry business.

Pitch your solution.

More than ⅔ rd of the Indian population lives in rural areas where the average annual household income is less than USD 1500. Rural women, in particular, have even lesser opportunities to earn a living. They mainly work as farm laborers where the wages are very low and the work is seasonal. This puts them in a vulnerable position with no means of income during most of the year.

Access Livelihoods Foundation (ALF) intends to develop a mobile application that will aid to scale household poultry rearing businesses in rural areas. The application will help in timely delivery of inputs, information on feed and medicine, and medical assistance in a reliable way even to the remotest villages.

The application can help small farmers across the world adopt poultry farming in a sustainable way providing them with additional income and also addressing the global food security issue in a sustainable manner.

What specific problem are you solving?

Poultry rearing is carried out by women farmers' at their houses.It requires constant monitoring of feed, timely administration of medicines, and regular inspection for the chicks to grow healthy and optimally. Due to lack of reliable and timely access to these services many small farmers are not able to undertake poultry rearing.

Gondia, a district in Maharashtra, India, where ALF has set up a farmers collective, has more than 2500 small farmers who can potentially undertake poultry rearing if provided with these services. Globally 80% of the rural households undertake poultry rearing [FAO] without access to timely and reliable access to inputs and information leading to under-realisation of income.

The major factor for collective inability to these services is the lack of an organised data collection (inputs) and information (feed and medicine) delivery mechanism. This shall be addressed through the proposed application.

What is your solution?

A mobile application to collect members’ input requirements, provide feed related information, medicine administration alerts, and remote health monitoring.

The mobile application will help the collective to increase the number of members by enabling remote assistance to members through the application. The application will perform the following functions.

Input requirement collection: it will allow the members to raise requirements for feed and medicine essential for rearing the chicks. These requirements are consolidated based on geographical location so as to optimize feed delivery logistics.
Feed monitoring: the application will inform the member on daily feed quantity to be given to the poultry based on the breed type, age, and weight of the chick.
Medicine administration: the application will alert the farmer to provide medicines/vaccination to the chicks based on their age.
Remote expert support: the application will allow the farmer to send photos and videos to an expert and get medical advice on time.
Full growth alert: the application will alert the farmer when the chick has grown to its full size based on the maturity period of the individual breed.

Who does your solution serve, and in what ways will the solution impact their lives?

The application will enable a greater number of women farmers to take up poultry rearing as a means of livelihood. Even members in remote villages can have timely and reliable access to inputs, feed information, and medical advice.

The application will provide livelihood security and help the members maximize their earnings from poultry rearing by:

Ensuring that members can receive inputs and start chick-rearing whenever they want and ensuring continuous availability of work and income.
Reducing feed consumption up to 10% and saving significant costs by informing the daily prescribed feed.
Ensuring timely administration of medicines to the birds by alerting the farmer, thereby reducing the mortality rate of the birds and significantly reducing losses.
Alerting the farmer when the poultry is fully grown and ready to be sold. This will bring down waste in feed and ensure timely realization of money.

On average, poultry rearing yields an additional income of Rs 15000 per year. It is an ideal subsidiary income-generating activity that requires very little time of the farmer.

With the use of the application, the collective can scale from current 150 members to 500 members with a total income generated worth INR 75,00,000 for the farmers.

Which dimension of the Challenge does your solution most closely address?

Support small-scale producers with access to inputs, capital, and knowledge to improve yields while sustaining productivity of land and seas

Explain how the problem, your solution, and your solution’s target population relate to the Challenge and your selected dimension.

India’s large and increasing population makes food security a big challenge in the coming decades. To meet the increased meat demand, businesses have turned to industrial rearing of poultry. Industrial poultry rearing is unsustainable in the long run because of its high carbon footprint and focuses on very few commercial breeds.

By bolstering individual poultry farmers the local food system can be preserved. This has a three front beneficial impact of reducing carbon footprint, saving indigenous breeds, and enhancing the income of farmers.

In what city, town, or region is your solution team headquartered?

Hyderabad, Telangana, India

What is your solution’s stage of development?

Concept: An idea being explored for its feasibility to build a product, service, or business model based on that idea

Who is the primary delegate for your solution?

Veeresh Halappa, Project Lead, ITS, ALC India.