Agri-Entrepreneurship: Opportunity Identification To Bankable Business Plan

RATIONALE

During these times of crisis due to COVID 19, when most sectors in the economy are in a slump, the agriculture sector has risen to become a beacon of hope and has the promise of leading the country’s economic recovery. Agriculture and allied activities clockied a growth rate of 3.4 per cent in the first quarter of 2020-21. According to CRISIL’s recent forecast, Indian Agriculture is likely to register a positive growth of about 2.5 per cent in 2020-21, even when the impact of COVID-19 will be on full display and affect the all other sectors adversely.

There has been huge demand for wide variety of agri based products and there is need to connect farmers with buyers, including retailers, e-commerce, processors, and even direct to consumers. Increased focus on health awareness, and desire to have uninterrupted supply of agri-based products at the doorsteps amid Covid 19 has further strengthened the scope of agri-entrepreneurship. The sector has witnessed constraints like lack of adequate quantity and appropriate quality of inputs and output, inefficient production techniques, inappropriate managerial skills, and lack of access to finance. For a sustainable growth in agriculture, fresh ideas need to be sown and human resource be equipped with sector specific knowledge and entrepreneurial skills.

In the above context, Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India (EDII) proposes to conduct online Entrepreneurship Development Programmes (EDPs) with an objective to motivate & empower numerous entrepreneurship aspirants as entrepreneurial individuals. A series of online EDPs will be conducted aiming selected agri-entrepreneurial opportunities. The current programme will focus on entrepreneurial opportunities identification and enterprise creation in the following areas:

• Floriculture
• Food processing
• Poultry
• Agri-Logistics

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

• To make participants more familiar with opportunities for entrepreneurship in the agriculture and allied sector.
• To facilitate the participants in understanding how to set up their own agri based enterpris.
• To handhold the participants in preparation of bankable business plan/project proposal for selected activities.