The coffee farmers of Araku valley these days get instant returns for their produce. Gone are the days when they had to wait for nearly a month till the buyers completed the weighing process of the produce and release money through co-operative society. Thanks to a mobile application developed by Hyderabad-based entrepreneur, Raghu Kanchustambham, there is no waiting period.
The app dubbed as ‘Livelihood 360 (L360)’ was adjudged the Best App of Asia in the Telenor Digital Winners Conference, a global competition held in Oslo, Norway this month. The award came with a cash prize of Rs. 9,79,000, which will be utilised by the developer to further “scale up” the concept.
It all started when Mr. Raghu, who has a start-up ‘Concept Wave’, met the officials of Naandi Foundation, which was already working with the coffee farmers of Araku valley. “The basic premise was to utilise technology and reach to those people not having access to technology and internet. I visited Araku valley and spent time with them and learnt a lot about their lifestyle and livelihood,” he said.
Mr. Raghu said the previous system of remittance to coffee growers in Araku was taking about a month. The coffee growers would take their produce to a prescribed ‘adda’ where the truck drivers would collect and transport coffee beans to another location for weighing and valuing. “We gave the truck drivers an application that would quantify the yield and also determine the quality instantly. The drivers will immediately remit the amount on the spot to farmers,” he explained.
Livelihood 360 is also capable of estimating quantity of the produce in the fields and sell the crop at fair price. “We have already adopted this application among 12,000 coffee farmers in 650 villages of Araku. Between 40 and 50 truck drivers from Araku were given training on using the application on a feature phone and not a smart phone,” he explained.
