Earth File

A recent trip to my native village taught me a new lesson in rural marketing with a live case study.

My curiosity triggered when I saw an Airtel and IFFICO branded truck standing in front of my house selling prepaid SIM cards to the farmers. My initial investigation started onsite by asking few people around the truck on what was so special about the SIM cards sold in the truck. Farmers were more than thrilled to speak about the cost benefit they were getting and customized value added services attached with the connection.

My second level investigation started once I was back in Bangalore. Like always, I Googled it to dig more information on the initiative. I found the news coverage on the JV launch, which apparently had happened just 15 days before I Googled it. I also felt bad for missing out the news when it happened which was covered in almost all the news and business portals in India.

It’s a new benchmark set by Bharti Airtel Limited, India’s leading integrated telecommunications services provider, and Indian Farmers Fertilizer Cooperative limited (IFFCO) to usher in the Second Green Revolution to benefit millions of rural consumers. The JV is called IFFCO Kisan Sanchar Ltd. (IKSL) to provide big boost to Indian agriculture and rural economy. IKSL will offer products and services, specifically designed for farmers, through IFFCO societies in villages across the country. On offer will be affordable mobile handsets bundled with Airtel mobile connection. The farmer will also get access to a unique VAS platform that will broadcast 5 free voice messages on mandi prices, farming techniques, weather forecasts, diary farming, animal husbandry, rural health initiatives and fertilizer availability etc. on a daily basis. In addition, the farmer will be able to call a dedicated helpline, manned by experts from various fields, to get answers to their specific queries. (not too sure if this is a toll free no.).

Bharti Airtel will offer competitive calling rates @ 50 paise/minute for calls between IFFCO members. This is expected to promote community building within the society and rural community at large. Bharti Airtel will also set up towers at sites provided by IFFCO societies to provide quality services to farmers.

By 2010, the rural population is likely to touch 800 million and two-thirds of those would be prospective mobile users. The platform will help make available voice advices in all local languages. The Indian farmer will be able to look forward to the benefits of mobile telephony and Internet.

Being a strong advocate of mobile as a medium to reach masses at the grass root level, here is one more reason for me to believe why mobile will overtake internet in the rural India.

During the last few visits to my native, I had been desperately trying to know the exact population of the region for which I got different answers from each one of them I met. Some said thousand and some said more. To my surprise I got the right answer from one of the newly launched unique website called OurVillageIndia.org.

A dedicated team of Indians and Indian Americans have developed OurVillageIndia.org that seeks to provide information about census data, geographic location, infrastructure facilities, local government, history, prominent people, interested volunteers, change-makers and NGOs for all the 600,000 plus villages of India. OurVillageIndia.org is dedicated to put every village in India on the web. Though the main goal is to create a web presence for every Indian city/town/village on the WWW map, the ultimate objective of the makers is to bring people in these places to come together to help their motherland. Organization’s mission is to help accelerate sustainable development in rural India by building up a network of social entrepreneurs, donors, volunteers, role models among individuals, NGOs, projects and village folks.
It’s a place where PIOs, NRIs and RIs can find their roots, learn what is going on and adopt villages/districts for rural development. It’s also a place where one can find subject matter experts on water, education, agriculture, livelihood, training, health, energy, ecology, sanitation and waste management. The portal will also serve to find role model villages and districts; new technologies and methods (solar energy, vermicompost, etc.); NGOs, which are doing work in villages; success stories; and information on how to replicate sustainable development in villages. If you are interested in publishing more information about the village you know, you will be able to request publishing rights for that village. If you are interested in a particular project, you will be able to send a request to the project owner to be included. With a very little effort, we all can make huge difference to the people living in the rural parts of the country by registering as voluntaries for either our own villages or to the villages we know.

For more details, log on to www.OurVillageIndia.org.

Remember RK Mishra? Winner of the much hyped yet sensible program on television called Lead India, an initiative in association with times of India. He is back again, for all the good reasons with a strategy in place to try and change the nation with the help of change agents (You & I), with a movement called change India. Unlike Miss Indias & worlds who vanish away after winning the title.

Everybody wants to change the nation, but no one knows where to start from. Here is a chance for people who are concerned about various issues hindering the growth of the nation. If you are game for it, all you have to do to start is to register online with http://www.changeindia.info/, opine, discuss, debate and analyze various issues of local/national interest. Bring together doers; Make a policy impact, create a self - sustaining eco – system and an ‘I will make a difference’ attitude.

Change India also provides space for various social entrepreneurs, activists, NGOs and advocacy groups to host, promote, seek funds and popularize their ideas, concepts, projects and organizations on http://www.changeindia.info/. This will give the members a ready shelf of ideas, projects and social entrepreneurship avenues.

Catch you on http://www.changeindia.info/

My work, family, friends and my lifestyle always gives me an opportunity to meet people from various walks of life, from farmers to entrepreneurs, techies to cabbies, housekeepers to house owners, socialites to social evils:). One common thing about all the people I meet is that when ever we catch up over a cup of coffee, knowingly or unknowingly we tend to discuss issues related to technological inventions in the recent past. Needless to say that the discussion predominantly revolves around the INTERNET and the way it is changing our life at the end of this century. Most of the time we only discuss about the initiatives which are made towards making life comfortable for the people who are already living in a comfort zone or leading a luxury lifestyles. Be it about the new feature added in the Mercedes cars, the online railway ticket booking systems, Job boards, eShopping, online banking or anything which falls in the same page. From New York to Tokyo, the Internet has fundamentally changed work, recreation, lifestyle, marriages and even love to name few. But in Kodihalli, a village in Karnataka or Patalgarh, a tribal hamlet in MadhyaPradesh, life remains very much the same as it was 10 years back.

I had been to Dharwar over the last weekend on a personal trip. Dharwar, a city, home of delicious, mouth watering Pedhas and for renowned centers of learning with various educational institutions and a city with various firsts to its credit.

My appetite to know new things about the places I visit triggered yet again. This time, top of the list on the menu was the new Community Radio Station (CSR) named as “Samudaya Banuli Kendra", launched recently targeting the farmers in and around the city. This of course has been launched as a pilot project covering the radius of 8-10kms, and will be extended to other parts of the district in the coming days.

Country’s first of its kind, this initiative is a brain child of The University of Agricultural Sciences (UAS), Dharwad, launched with the financial assistance of the Union Government. The whole idea behind this launch was to reach the farmers through the medium of radio, which is a powerful medium to interact with themasses at the grassroots level and try to address their problems. The channel, with the catch line “Raitharinda Raitharige”, (by the farmers, for the farmers), deals with issues related to agriculture, health, nutrition, hygiene and income generating schemes for farmers. Apart from the said programmes, progressive farmers in the region are also invited to give advice to the farmers and to share the secrets of their success. An advisory committee has been formed which comprises officials from the University staff, five men farmers, five women farmers and two non-governmental organizations to take care of the content and programmes that catch the attention of farmers. Apart from this, local farmers and public are also invited to give their opinion and suggestions to improve the channel.

These kinds of initiatives will definitely help farmers to learn new methods of cultivation as well as find solutions to the problems they face in their day to day life and will defenietly bring in reforms to the already sinking industry. CRSs should in fact go one step ahead and provide information about the buyers, co-operative societies etc. More and more multinational companies in the country should launch CRS as part of their corporate social responsibility initiative, if it is sustainable (CRS at Dharwar was set up at the cost of 15L). Radio surely has more reach than the online initiatives which are currently operative in the same segment. Having said that, I completely accept the fact that online initiatives are doing a fairly good job, but it definitely takes some time to reach the masses at the grassroots level. Hope to see CRSs targeting farmers at every district headquarters in the next few years to come.