AgriClear

PROBLEM: The lack of  transparency and traceability of products and activities in the agri supply chain has led to various problems in Nepali agri sector. Firstly, local produce do not have a competitive advantage over cheaper imports. Therefore, farmers are forced to sell far below the cost of production. Secondly, middlemen take the largest margin due to lack of access to market information. Finally, modern consumers demand to produce that is fresh, palatable, nutritious which is impossible to verify.

SOLUTION: AgriClear envisions to solve these issues through proper documentation in the supply chain through blockchain based tool which track and record activities and cost involved through farm to table. The tool will make farmers more accountable as they have to log records. This will promote good agricultural practices among farmers which will create healthier and safer produces for consumers.

According to the International Labour Organisation, agriculture provides livelihoods for 68 percent of Nepal's population, accounting for 34 percent of the GDP. Nevertheless, Nepal struggles to produce an adequate supply of food for its citizens. Nepali farmers have limited access to information, new technologies, and market opportunities. Declining agricultural production has depressed rural economies and increased widespread hunger and urban migration.

Nepali agricultural produce lacks product identity. They struggle to get reasonable market price against Indian produce. Majority of vegetables are rotting in the farmlands due to the failure to fetch better price rates. Nepal relies heavily on India for agricultural products despite being a country where a majority of the population is engaged in agriculture. A recent statistics released by the Ministry of Agriculture, Land Management and Cooperatives (MoALMC) show that the country imported agricultural products worth more than NRs 72 billion in 2017-18 fiscal year. 

The consumers would prefer local produce despite of its relatively higher price if it is  justifiable by its transparency. The accountability in tracking the product in agri-supply chain is vital, and also ensures good agricultural practices among farmers.

Nepal has more than 50% of people engaged in agriculture. We aim to serve various stakeholders in agri supply chain to make it more efficient and transparent. The ability to do so can improve the socio-economic conditions of the rural farmers.

Commercial Farmers, aggregators and retailers. In recent years, Nepali farming has been adopting hi-tech production practices. The farmers commercially sell their produce in the market. They need to be accountable towards the consumers with produce and other side needs to know about the price. The farmers  will use the AgriClear mobile app to record information according to crop cycle. The produce will carry QR code with farming practices information. The app will not only log data but help farmers follow good agricultural practice for better and safer consumer produce.  

Consumers. The problem is, consumers do not know anything about the origins of their food that they are buying. The urban consumers need these information for safer and healthier food. Consumers purchasing produce can take a picture of a unique QR code on the produce packaging to discover everything they want to know about the production, freshness, and farming practices that went into the production of their food. 

AgriClear is a blockchain based tool to track and record activities and cost involved in agri-supply chain. The mobile and web based tool will be able to follow the movement of produce through specified stages of production, processing and distribution providing end-to-end transparency. 

This verifiable evidence of traceability can give consumers increased trust in the products that they buy and it is also an opportunity to reward the farmers who employ good agricultural practices to cultivate their produce. With the traceability tool on blockchain, beneficiary groups will get to know the status of the produce right from seedling to delivery by scanning bar or QR code associated with that produce. With the proliferation of smartphones, the tracking and recording of produce’s evidence in each stage of the supply chain will be easier. The information recorded and logged by users in each stage in agri supply chain will be stored in blockchain based ledger - when once verified can’t be changed. 

Agriclear has following features - 

1. Crop calendar. The Crop Calendar is a tool that provides timely information about seeds to promote local crop production and good agricultural practices. AgriClear will notify farmers when certain farming tasks are due and needs to be logged on to the system.

2. Intuitive mobile-based data logging for farmers. We have made data logging easier for the stakeholders. The users record data through mobile phone i.e, take photos against crop calendar activities. The information regarding timestamp, and location can be recorded automatically through mobile device.

3. QR code-based activity tracking. The users can record and see information on agri supply chain. The farmers scan the QR code associated with the produce whenever crop calendar notifies and logs the data. The consumers can see the information of recorded data for the produce once QR code is scanned when buying it. 

4. Third party data usage/subscription. The data recorded can be used by third parties like aggregators, insurance companies, retailers, researchers and government agencies. They will subscribe for the data.  This will help in the process of crop insurance.

Tracking and traceability in agriculture are essential for consumers and farmers to create value. Agricultural ecosystem in Nepal doesn’t have proper standards, regulations and recording mechanisms for good agricultural practices.  Lack of certification of Nepalese agricultural products has been causing post-harvest loss as well as it has been diminishing the consumer’s trust on the products in international as well as domestic market. Nepal needs to modernize its agricultural process through the use of available technologies. 

AgriClear helps log agricultural activities which hasn’t been properly documented before by Nepali farmers through smartphones. To make it farmer friendly, they just take photos against the crop activities and phone automatically logs GPS coordinates and timestamps. This creates minimum to no friction in learning new application. The farm administrators can add further information regarding the activity via webapp. In future, we will use IoT and sensors to track these activities removing the need for manual data entry. This tracking and traceability in farming agri supply is new in Nepal which will ensure  good agricultural practices are followed by the producers.

The core technology behind Agriclear to maintain its trust, transparency in  different farming activities over the agri supply chain is blockchain. Blockchain is a public record of transactions and activities. It is a decentralized database in which data is shared across the network of the nodes. Once a record has been added to the chain, it is very difficult to change it. All the nodes maintain a copy of transactions that took place in the system and the network makes a constant check to ensure that these copies are the same in the network and not tampered or altered. Transactions are stored in the form of blocks, which are linked to each other by cryptographic hashing (similar to fingerprint), which ultimately forms a chain.

We are  using Ethereum blockchain platform for building our smart contracts which will help in recording the agricultural processes like planting seeds, use of fertilizers, nurturing of plants, harvesting, packaging and transfer of the product from one place to another which can be later tracked by the end user and even by the wholesalers ,retailers and third parties. Ethereum is widely used blockchain technology and provides good infrastructure to deploy smart contracts which will optimize the agri supply chain. 

We are partnering with a local farm in Sindhuli, Nepal  and an online retailer based in Kathmandu to pilot this system.  We completed our preliminary research to identify the need of agri supply chain tracking system. 

Activities: First of all, AgriClear system needs to be deployed with partner aggregators and retailers. The users will be trained on using the system. Once, the system is setup, farmers, aggregators, and wholesalers use smartphones and web-based app to record agri supply chain information. 

Output: The agri supply chain information and activities of produce will be logged - seed, harvesting, fertilizers used, and cost involved. This information can be used for monitoring compliance with quality, environmental, and other product and/or process attributes related to produce.

Short Term Outcome: The consumers can use information  establish safety of food products which will make farmers, retailers, and aggregators more accountable towards much needed good agricultural practices. 

Long Term Outcome: Eventually, the producers will get better market price for their produce once the information is transparent. The information will make local produce friendlier to the consumers over foreign imports from India. This will make local produce trustworthy.

Current # of people: 0 Currently, the product is in prototype and beta testing with our partners. We are building internal system for our partners Sindhuli Agro Company and Patalegaun Organic Farm - aggregators and Green Growth- distributor. We intend to use test the system within this 2020.  

# of people serving in one year: 1,000+ We will pilot the system in our partner network which has about 1,000 customer base through Green Growth’s user base and more than 50 farmers working through commercial farming. The first year we will be testing and piloting the system with our partner network.   

# of people serving in five years: 10,000 We plan to onboard at least 100 aggregators and 50 distributors within five years to our system. We predict as aggregators and distributors increase, the customer base will grow exponentially with their network. Based on our preliminary research, this would help us cater at least 10,000 users.  

The main objective for this year is to launch and pilot our product - AgriClear with our partners. Here’s our timeline within the next year for AgriClear. We have mapped out our roadmap for 2019/2020 as follows. 

• June 2019 - September 2019: We will design web app and mobile app with our partners.
• September 2019: Pitch for Social Innovation Challenge second round. 
• October 2019 - March 2020: Pilot for the project with the partners.
• April 2020: Officially launch product at Nepal Agritech International Expo - http://nepalagritech.com.np/  
• August 2020: Monitoring and evaluation of pilot with 1,000 end users will result in further exploration and scaling of the product.  

Our goals within the next 5 years include: 

• Expand our partnership to include 100 aggregators and 50 distributors in our network
• Onboard government support to at least to inspect agri supply chain 
• Onboard at least 100,000 users into our system
• Become a trusted provider of agri supply data to various stakeholders and beneficiaries 

Our major barriers for the next year are - 

1. Difficulty in data logging. The farmers need to follow good agricultural practices and log information into the system. The behavioural change of logging the that using smart phone might be difficult.
2. Data authenticity. The stakeholders in the agri supply chain might not be interested in sharing information to others. They might even collude to tamper the data. The farmers might not input correct information or miss logging in the data due to human error.
3. Blockchain implementation. The blockchain technology is in very nascent stage and the infrastructure and architecture of the technology will evolve. The technology will add overhead setup and operational cost.

After the product is piloted and rolled out, we expect to face certain resistance from stakeholders especially in adopting our app in following ways -

1. Price sensitive consumers. The most of the consumers could still be price sensitive towards the produce and might not want to spend extra on safer produce tracked by AgriClear. This will not entice many retailers opting the tracking service.
2. Difficulty in onboarding third parties. The governing agencies like Organic Certification Nepal needs to be onboard in our network. They need to encourage and enforce the system.  

We will overcome the above mentioned barriers-

1. Difficulty in data logging. We are practicing human centered design and immersive to understand user experience for data logging. Once AgriClear is launched we will setup customer service hotline and regular training for the clients. We will use visual marketing collaterals for users. Currently, we are making the data logging farmer friendly. To log the data farmers will open the app, scan QR code and take photo proof. The system will automatically log GPS position and timestamp from the phone. If additional information needs to be added computer/web app will be used. 

2. Price sensitive consumers. The information tracked will be used mostly for urban consumers. The information will be useful for the inspecting agencies and financial institutions. These agencies will be willing to subscribe for the recorded data of the produce.

3. Difficulty in onboarding third parties. We will have to meet, present and demo our product values to onboard the third parties. 

4. Data authenticity. To remove human intervention, we intend to use IoT and sensors in the future. But, currently we are digitizing the agri supply chain process by logging data from stakeholders themselves. We are using our investigators and inspectors to authenticate the data.

5. Blockchain implementation. Initially, we won’t be implementing the blockchain. AgriClear will support stakeholders record and review activities to ensure good agricultural practices. Once the workflow for good agricultural practices is setup in agri supply chain, then blockchain infrastructure would be setup.

eSatya is blockchain initiative by Rumsan Associates in Nepal that specializes in development, consulting and awareness. We believe blockchain technology can provide new infrastructure to build the next innovative applications beyond cryptocurrencies, driving profound, positive changes across business, communities and society. Satya (सत्य) is Nepali word for the truth. Blockchain is a potential “truth machine” for the world’s transactions. Hence, the name eSatya.

AgriClear is one of the blockchain projects of eSatya focusing on agri supply chain. eSatya has provided logistic, administrative, financial and technical support for AgriClear project team.  

Currently, there are four dedicated members in our team along with one admin and finance staff from eSatya. 

1. Mr. Ruchin Singh - Co-Founder https://www.linkedin.com/in/ruchinsingh/
2. Ms. Shristi Piya - Chief Executive Officer https://www.linkedin.com/in/shristi-piya-27052210a/
3. Mr. Bibek Koirala - Chief Blockchain Officer https://www.linkedin.com/in/bibek-koirala-b16187160/ 
4. Mr. Ankit Thapa - Chief Marketing Officer  https://www.linkedin.com/in/ankit-thapa-974370148/

We come from diverse backgrounds and expertise. We bring in expertise in agriculture and blockchain along with project management. Ruchin has more than 10 years of experience in building for profit and not for profit organization in Nepal. He co-founded eSatya and initiated Nepal’s only blockchain advocacy and think tank in Nepal - Blockchain Foundation Nepal. Shristi has experience in organic farming and vermicomposting. She is a budding social entrepreneur in Nepali community also working on blood management and logistics in Nepal. Bibek has more than two years of experience on building applications in blockchain as chief blockchain officer at eSatya. Ankit has been leading marketing in Nepal’s leading blockchain based company eSatya for past year.

The team has initiated various blockchain applications in Nepal. Recently, the team was awarded as winner in public administration category in Smart Urban Challenge by the Prime Minister of Nepal for their blockchain land registry product. The team not only has expertise in product development but, has more than 10 years of experience of implementing and taking products to Nepalese market. 

Currently, the product is in prototype and beta testing with our partners. We are building internal system for our partners Sindhuli Agro Company and Patalegaun Organic Farm, aggregator and Green Growth, distributor. We intend to use test the system within this 2020. Sindhuli Agro Company and Patalegaun Organic Farm uses AgriClear to log the good agricultural practice data. They have set aside approximately 11,000 sq feet of land for the pilot. Green Growth is an urban online retailer and we will be logging food mile, storage and consumer behavior of their 1000 customers. 

We are partnering with eSatya for blockchain proof of concept and product development. They are supporting the team with Hyperledger blockchain prototype. They have also committed financial and logistical support to kick off our project. 

Our team is currently being mentored by experts from UN Capital Development Fund. 

The team believes in lean model and has adopted business model canvas for designing our business model. It is a lot easier to tweak the model and try things in business model canvas. The business model canvas can be found here -> http://bit.ly/30JG2gH 

The implementation of blockchain in agriculture can help create an identity of the agricultural products along with trust and transparency. The consumers can trace and recall specific events life cycle. This ensures farmers and producers follow good agricultural practices when farming. The system uses crop calendar and QR codes to track various activities through smartphones. This ensures good agricultural practices are followed by the producers and distributors. Our customer segments who will use our services include - 

1. Commercial farmers, and aggregators. They will track activities of their produce during farming process. 

2. Retailers and distributors. They have fixed retail brick and mortar or online shops to sell to consumers. The retailers will carry produce with QR code so that consumer can scan. 

3. Consumers. Consumers purchasing produce can take a picture of a unique QR code on the produce packaging to discover everything they want to know about the production, freshness, and farming practices that went into the production of their food.  

4. Third Parties.  Third parties like financial institutions, regulators and researchers can use agri supply chain data like cost, price, how produce was grown etc. This information is vital for loan, forecasting and verify authenticity of a producer. 

We require around NRs. 10,000,000/- (approx. $90,000) to build proof of concept and pilot AgriClear. The funding for this will be raised through private investment capitals, and grants.

Our main revenue stream will be from subscription fee for our agri clear app from our various customer groups once the product is rolled out after piloting in 2021. Once the system is implemented and rolling, we have various B2B user groups who will subscribe to the service monthly starting from 2021.  Here’s the tentative subscription from various customer groups - Customer service User Group and their monthly subscription fee -

• Aggregators - NRs. 25,000/- (approx. $230)
• Retailers - NRs. 15,000/- (approx. $140)
• Third Party - NRs. 50,000/- (approx. $450)

Our another revenue stream, we estimate 2%-4% of total revenue comes from ad on our AgriClear app from third parties.

We are applying for Solve to accelerate and accelerate our pilot to implementation by not only having access to the funds but MIT backed Solve network as well. We believe the resources from Solve will support us scale our idea beyond Nepal to South Asia and Latin America where most countries are agrarian. 

The technology is in nascent stage and lots of research and collaboration is still required. Since, not much information about implementation of blockchain is publicly available, we want to understand/research current scenario of how Solve partners and community are using this technology. We want to learn about good blockchain software development and project management. We also want to understand about blockchain projects being implemented in the agricultural sector. This will help us emulate good practices of the technology in our own project. 

Once selected, we want to refine the idea for global community besides Nepal. We want to research and learn more about global community if this or similar solution can be used for in other countries to solve food traceability and transparency issue. Solve program will help us take this idea beyond Nepal by providing us opportunity to pilot on other geographical locations. 

Through Solve, we would get an opportunity to showcase the impact of the technology in agriculture sector (beyond cryptocurrencies). We expect this will help other emerging organizations explore and implement the technology to bring about much needed social and impactful change. This is one of the goals of our parent organization.

In our preliminary research we have identified following partnerships would be beneficial for our solutions. 

1. Blockchain infrastructure solution. There are various blockchain infrastructures like IBM Food Trust, Root Stock etc, that AgriClear can use to create a robust blockchain system. We are looking for these partners to support us with their technology infrastructure. As far as our knowledge, these agencies still haven’t worked with Nepali client because there are no blockchain projects.

2. Blockchain research firms. The information available and use cases are limited in blockchain projects compared to other technologies like AI and IoT. We would like to partner with blockchain consulting and research firms help us navigate through blockchain i.e, good practices, analyzing cost benefit overhead of project, etc. We have identified following the leading organizations - ConsenSys and Blockchain Research Institute that we can partner for the projects.

3. Agriculture consultants and community. We would like to understand how technology is implemented in various agricultural aspects. We would like to get support and mentorship from MIT Food & Agriculture Club, MIT Open Agriculture Initiative and CGIAR to help us implement and scale up the project.

4. Funding agencies. We are looking for funding agencies (angel investors and seed investors) or to apply for grants to pilot the project. We are looking for agricultural grants  and funds to scale and implement the pilot.

One of the features in AgriClear is crop calendar. This calendar guides farmers on good agricultural practices by helping them during planning and planting phase of agricultural produce. Therefore, crop calendar is vital for tracking week-by-week development for produce. With the help of AI, the crop calendar can predict shifts in crop cycle due to climate change and other anomalies and suggest improvements for crop growth. 

The system would utilize historical information on planting, sowing and harvesting periods of locally adapted crops along with climate information to predict the best possible time for plantation. AI in AgriClear aims to optimize the production by matching good farming practices more closely to crop needs eg, fertilizer inputs during drought.  

One of the biggest challenges in the agricultural sector is the products don’t have identity. They have complicated ecosystems with a lot of moving parts. Once the produce enters the market from the farm, it becomes a part of the larger supply chain involving a lot of intermediaries. The consumers need information regarding where and how the food has been produced. This creates an identity for food products and much needed food safety by increasing accountability among the stakeholders in agri supply chain. 

We can transparently track quality of food using the blockchain technology and reduce cases of illegal harvesting. Blockchain in agriculture is one of the compelling use cases that makes the process of growing and supplying food simpler. The agriculture supply chain can provide all involved parties with a single source of truth.

As mentioned earlier, we intend to use the prize money to further research, develop and pilot our product using the blockchain technology.