The Vidarbha region of Maharashtra is infamous for the poor living and working conditions of its farmers. The severe agrarian distress, brought on by high cultivation costs and low profits, exploitation, mounting debts from moneylenders, and lack of market linkages, has pushed many farmers in the region to go so far as to commit suicide. 

Having grown up in a smallholder farming family in the Vidarbha region, Shweta Thakare was all too familiar with the plight of the farmers. That’s why she became determined to help farmers increase their incomes and bring dignity to their work. 

After first forming an advocacy organization with several friends to address the systemic injustice farmers in the region were facing, Shweta shifted her focus from advocacy to social enterprise, and founded GramHeet. GramHeet aims to provide village-level solutions to farmers, including inputs supply, storage facilities, market linkages, and post-harvest credit, all with the goal of increasing their income by reducing expenses and offering better prices for their produce.

Shweta recently completed the 2021 Scale-Ups Accelerator Program, along with women-entrepreneurs representing eight other job-creating businesses in India. The program, run by Upaya and MIT D-Lab, was designed to equip women entrepreneurs with the knowledge and connections to grow their businesses and tackle the unique challenges female founders encounter while fundraising. We’re so pleased to share the Q&A with Shweta below about her background and vision for her business. 

What inspired you to start GramHeet?

I come from a smallholder farming family. I have seen my parents working on the farm day in and day out. Every year, we cultivated with the hope that that year we will be able to repay the loan which we had taken from the village moneylender, but that never happened. 

Even after working so hard, the income was not enough to feed the family of four. The family situation got worse, and, after a point, it was so difficult for us to manage family expenses through farming that this vicious debt cycle led us to leave the village. So, we decided to leave the farm and go to the city for daily labor work. 

I grew up seeing my parent’s struggle as farmers. Every year, managing my education expenses was a challenging aspect of their life. All these experiences left a deep impression on my heart which motivated me to start GramHeet. 

What issues are you trying to address with your business?

When I think about the situation that my family faced, I think there are millions of farmers in India who would also be facing this situation. Even though Indian farmers have increased their production and productivity, their income always seems negligible. Agriculture in India faces many problems such as high cost of cultivation, poor post-harvest infrastructure, exploitation by intermediaries, low price discovery, and lack of market linkages. 

These factors have made farming an unviable profession and pushed millions of farmers into a vicious debt cycle. Based on a survey conducted, 60% farmers say that they want to give up farming. 

This has been the inspiring factor for me to start GramHeet, which provides such a system for the farmers which will help increase their incomes and help them to feel that farming is a dignified profession — that farming is a profitable business. Rather than it being a forced profession for them, they will choose to farm. This is what our inspiration is for GramHeet. 

At what point did you decide to become an entrepreneur?

Actually, I never thought of becoming an entrepreneur or taking this path. After completing my graduation, I started my work with activism. The area that I belong to, the Vidarbha region of Maharashtra, is infamous for farmer suicides and agrarian distress. Therefore, my primary focus was to challenge the systematic injustice with the farming community in India.  

After completing my graduation in 2010, five friends and I co-founded KASTKAR, an organization with the mission to build farmer-centric systems to address the complex issues of their life. However, we were not satisfied with the work we are doing, as farmer suicides were at the peak at that time. After working for three years in KASTKAR, I realized that I need to explore other paths also to work on these complex issues of agrarian distress. Based on my experiences and grassroots understanding, I shifted my path from advocacy-based work to social enterprise. 

What is your vision for the company?

I am committed to build an ecosystem where every farmer cultivates with dignity and feeds the world with pride. The ecosystem ensures farming as a profitable and secured profession for millions of smallholder farmers. 

How is GramHeet impacting the farmers’ lives?   

Through our interventions, farmers can store their produce at our Village Trade Centre and avail the post-harvest credit against stored produce. Therefore, they can hold produce for 3-5 months and get seasonal price grain up to 30%. The agency that they get—choosing where to sell and at what price—which they otherwise never had, is an important change in their life.

Due to the availability of our services at the village level, it is easier for the women farmers to become a part of the agri value chain which was denied for them in the existing system because women cannot go and sell in the Mandis. And I am happy to share that 20% of our beneficiaries are women farmers.

Can you tell us about a farmer you work with? 

So, one of our women farmers, She is a widow and had never been to a Mandi to sell her produce. So far, it’s been her relatives who have sold the produce for her. When she found out about GramHeet, she herself came to us, I spoke to her and explained that she can store or sell her produce. Availability of the GramHeet’s village trade center in her village seems a very convenient option for her. So she decided to sell her 5 QTL of Tur to GramHeet. She expressed that she has been working from childhood in her farm but never sells her produce by herself. First time she experienced the ownership of her produce. 

Did you face any challenges getting the farmers on board with your business?

Yes. So, currently in the Government agri market, there is no process for price determination. Traders just bite the grain and decide the quality and price. There is no standard procedure. We have come up with a unique method to determine all the quality analysis parameters such as moisture, foreign material and damage material as per the requirement of institutional buyers. But for farmers, this process is completely new for them. At the start, the acceptance level was low regarding quality analysis and price determination which are the crucial components of our services. 

So, we told farmers to sell some part of the produce to GramHeet and some to the Government agri market and compare prices. They experienced the difference between the prices and also realised that they are getting good prices at GramHeet. They themself took the initiative to spread the word among other farmers. Also, through our village meetings we conveyed the benefits of the whole process of quality analysis to farmers. All these things then lead to an increase in the acceptance of GramHeet and GramHeet’s services.

What is keeping you up at night?

Every year farmers sow the seed with a lot of expectation and hope that this is the year they will be able to get rid off from the debt trap and fulfill the basic needs of the family. But this remains a hope for them every year. And over time, this becomes so intense that they can only think of two options—either quit farming or take their own life. This is the worst scenario for me. When I see such disappointed farmers around me, this is what keeps me up at night and makes me feel that we must continue the work that we are doing. 

On the other side, what motivates you to continue doing this everyday?

When farmers are able to make the decision to sell their produce directly to the processors through a single click on their mobile phones. When a farmer holds that mobile with a smiling face that motivates me!

When a woman farmer comes to our village trade center to sell her produce and feels the pride to be a true owner of her produce. That satisfaction on her face motivates me.

What has been your biggest takeaway ever since you started your entrepreneurial journey?

We realized that the perfect solution cannot be ready from day one. Initially, I tried to prove how my solution is perfect rather than trying to make it perfect. Through my entrepreneur journey, I learned to never fall in love with the first solution as it can be evolved over time. Therefore I believe the approach of developing the right solution is “fail fast, learn faster”. 

Did you face any challenges being a woman entrepreneur in a male dominated sector? 

As a woman entrepreneur, especially when you come from the rural part of the country, proving yourself is the biggest challenge itself. When I decided to start my own company, convincing my parents and my in-laws was the biggest task of my entrepreneurship journey. Instead of putting my time and efforts into validating my business idea, I had to validate myself as an entrepreneur to my family members. Therefore, rather than shifting my identity from house-wife to entrepreneur, I carry all the identities altogether — Mother, Student, House-wife, Daughter, and Co-founder. 

What advice would you give other aspiring entrepreneurs?

As a social entrepreneur, when you are solving society's complex issues, challenges, uncertainty, and risk will be the inherent part of your journey. We need just to accept these challenges and move ahead with those learnings. Because, in this entrepreneurial journey we have to carry Passion, People, Patience and Paisa (money).