Safe to Eat fruits and vegetables traced to the farmers through Know your farmer technology
Founded in the year 2015 by software engineer turned Entrepreneur, Pradeep P S, FarmersFZ is a multichannel marketplace platform, which bridges the gap between rural farmers and urban customers to provide healthy, premium quality and pesticide-free vegetables and fruits directly from field to the table. Coming from an agricultural family background, Pradeep identified and realized the need for proper marketing of agriculture produce when he noticed some of his family members themselves finding it difficult to sell their produce at a reasonable price. This prompted Pradeep to explore the possibilities of e-commerce for marketing of the agricultural produce and thus conceptualized the idea of FarmersFZ
Met Pradeep in 2016, Agri Hackathon organized by Haani a 21 year old Kannur. After seeing his drive, I’ve made a wonderful field visit in 2017
Back to 1498…
Irinjalakuda – train arrived at 6:30 AM welcomed by monsoon. Hailing from a rain shadow region of Tamil Nadu, never see this much rain – was joking to entrepreneurs in Kerala that just bottle the monsoon rain and sell it. With this much natural resources, I was told Kerala gets vegetables from outside – Irinjalakuda trip was all about that.
After visiting Kodakara, we proceeded to see this young farmer, Renjith Ravindran in Ashtamichira, Mala, Kerala. He leases the farmland and growing vegetables using safe to eat practices. Last summer he made a profit of 3 lakhs growing cucumber. Great to see few more younger farmers like Sreejith, Vijith [more]
Attapadi here we come…
One afternoon, I received a call from the Institute of Societal Advancement (ISA), Trivandrum, Kerala. They had noticed the article Money from Angel which was featured in Mathrubhumi Newspaper, an esteemed media in Kerala. He requested me to visit some agricultural work in one of the tribal belts of Kerala – Attappadi. I was not familiar with the place, but his explanations made me curious about the whole thing in no time. [more]
Funded!
Agritech Startup Farmersfz Raises Investment from Indian Angel Network
Nagaraja Prakasam veteran IAN investor who led over 9 deals including Uniphore, Gocoop, Freshworld, Saahas zero waste, Neurosynaptic Communication s, SP Robotics, Carbon Masters, Nativespecial, Solaron will be taking the board seat. [more]
How my portfolio is demonstrating Circular Economy
On this world environment day 2020, very proud how 4 of my portfolio demonstrating circular economy. Very soon the food waste I threw at IIMB will come to my home as Lumiere organic papaya! [more]
Carbon masters and Farmers Fresh Zone ink MoU to help kerala farmers improve their soil fertility and grow healthier food
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Bangalore based clean-tech start-up Carbon Masters and Kerala based Agritech start-up Farmers Fresh Zone are joining hands to help Kerala farmers improve their soil fertility and grow healthier food… The MOU was signed in IIM Bangalore under what is now commonly known as the “Naga tree” a place where Naga mentors start-ups from NSRCSEL,IIMB Bangalore[more]
Pre Series A Funded!
D2C fresh FnV online marketplace Farmers Fresh Zone raises INR 6 Cr in pre-series A round led by IAN
Nagaraja Prakasam, Lead Investor at IAN and board member of Farmers Fresh Zone said, “FFZ has consolidated its position strongly during the pandemic by moving 100% online and away from physical stores. Growing 600% during this time, FFZ is well positioned to crack the D2C fresh FnV space comparable to how on-demand meat delivery has taken off in the country.
FFZ is leaving no stone unturned in ensuring the best quality products to their consumers, and helping farmers sell pesticide-free products while securing fair rates for their produce. Recently, FFZ was recognized by UN for its low carbon initiative. We are pleased to make this contribution and hope the company achieves its goals and marks its presence globally.”
Prakasam, who is a veteran IAN lead investor, has led over 9 IAN deals notably, Conversational AI Uniphore that raised $140M Series D, and EdTech SP Robotic Works $3M Series A recently. [more]