AgriGation - Empowering Farmer Collectives - FPO Leadership Summit & Exhibition organised successfully

Lucknow: Knowledge Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) successfully organized FPO Leadership Summit & Exhibition at Indira Gandhi Pratishthan, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh recently. The other organisation includes UP FPO, SFAC and Summit is supported by the Ministry of Food Processing Industries (MoFPI).  On the occasion of Chaudhary Charan Singh Jayanti, The Govt. of Uttar Pradesh also awarded Farmers, Agripreneurs and Agriculture Scientists during the program.

Uttar Pradesh has played a key role in agriculture production with the highest grain, milk, and meat production, which are main commodities keeping food security in mind. Considering the facts, UP is a focused state for all Agri-value chain companies, right from input, farm mechanization, processors, exporters, and other allied service providers. However, because 92% of farmers in the state are small and marginal, and their average land holding is 30% lower than the national average, value chain companies find it difficult to engage with their last-mile customers or suppliers. And the gap is widening further.

The AgriGation - FPO Leadership Summit and Exhibition was organized on National Farmers Day, December 23, 2022, at the Indira Gandhi Pratishthan in Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh. The summit featured 2500 participants, including farmer-producer organizations representing 7 lakh farmers from 12000 villages across Uttar Pradesh, as well as a large number of corporates involved in the Agri Value Chain.

To address farm sector challenges, the Indian government is promoting programs to collectivize smallholder farmers into legal entities such as farmer-producer organizations. Uttar Pradesh's state government also focuses on farmer's collectivization by forming 4000 new FPOs through a state government scheme and connecting them to various government departments. The move to set up more FPOs is seen as an attempt to boost farmers' income and formalize the agriculture sector at large.

As a pre-event, 25 sessions of 60 minutes in the form of Webinars were organized in 5 days from 13-18 December 2022, which saw the participation of around 1000 FPO representatives and a total of 40,000 farmers participated and through which around 500 MOUs were signed between FPO's and Agri and consumer industries.

The AgriGation 2022 was inaugurated by the Hon'ble Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh - Shri Yogi Adityanath Ji, where he also mentioned, "Aaj kheti kisani me lage hue hamare annadata kisan na kewal is kshetra me majbooti ke sath pradesh krishi vikas ko aage badhane Mein apna yogdan hai rahe hai. in the presence of Hon'ble Minister of Agriculture - Shri Surya Pratap Shahi, Govt of Uttar Pradesh, Sugarcane Minister - Shri Laxmi Narayan Chaudhary, Hon'ble Minister of Agriculture for State - Shri Baldev Singh Aulakh, Govt of Uttar Pradesh, Additional Chief Secretary Agriculture - Dr Devesh Chaturvedi, Uttar Pradesh State, and representatives of UP FPO.

The event was organized with a vision to reach out to 0.7 million UP farmers by connecting 1000 collectives (FPOs), develop an alternate channel for last-mile delivery of products and services by partnering with FPOs, Connect & collaborate with governments & policymakers as the Hon'ble CM UP, Hon'ble Minister of Agriculture, GOI & top officials are attending the event.

Two technical sessions were organized, one with Government representatives and another with Industries. Both sessions helped a lot of FPO representatives with their queries. The panel sessions included people from different Agricultural industries to discuss the opportunities in their respective sectors and government policies and solutions in these sectors. It was a fruitful discussion between the Panel. The Panel included; Mr Atul Kumar, General Manager Sales (North) – Dhanuka Agritech Limited. Mr Rituraj Sharma, Founder & CEO – Growpital/Zetta Farms, Mr. Aditya Nath Jha, Territory Manager - Andreas STIHL Private Limited, Mr. Anoop Kumar Mishra, FPO Manager - Yara Fertilisers India Private Limited, Mr. Ajeet Chahal, Head Key Accounts - Bayer Cropscience Limited, Dr. A. K. Verma, Head – Silage Division - Kapila Krishi Udyog Limited,Mr. Dhruv Sharma, Sr. Investment Specialist - Invest India (MoFPI), Mr. Aleen Mukherjee, COO – NICR, Head FPO Strategy - National Commodity and Derivatives Exchange (NCDEX).

It was a fruitful event for all the Agricultural industry people who were present there at the event, and all the FPOs who attended the event from the State of Uttar Pradesh were happy to be a part of it. 

Dr. Amit Joshi, Mr. Nakul Prakash Lakhe and Mr. Mihir Chauhan, Directors, represented the Knowledge Chamber of Commerce and Industry and thanked the Sponsors, Exhibitors and all the participants who make this event successful. Looking at the response of the FPOs, they also showed their intentions to do the event again in a grand scale next year as well.