Agrifood Tech | May 30, 2024

ResponsAbility invests in India’s FarMart to streamline food supply chains

Lucy Ngige
ImpactAlpha Editor

Lucy Ngige

Gurgaon-based FarMart is working to improve the efficiency and cut waste from India’s food supply chains through a network of 3,500 local logistics providers and 3,000 mom and pop agri-retailers. The company claims its logistics orchestration reduces greenhouse gas emissions from food transit by 33% and has avoided more than 30,000 tons of food loss.

Its service also provides income stability and new income streams for both farmers and retailers (listen to ImpactAlpha’s podcast with FarMart’s Samridhi Singh).

FarMart inked $2.8 million from Switzerland-based responsAbility, which invested via its climate-smart agriculture fund. The capital will help FarMart “quantify carbon footprint reduction and provide capacity-building for farmers to promote sustainable agricultural practices,” a responsAbility spokesman told ImpactAlpha.

Retail digitalization

More than two million small agri-retailers provide seeds, fertilizers and other critical farm supplies to India’s 150 million smallholder farmers. FarMart’s mobile app gives these retailers a digital upgrade; the company also supports them in serving as produce aggregation points for farmers, improving farmers’ market access and giving retailers an additional revenue stream.