The Hindu Business Line : e-Choupal, a novel pvt sector initiative: Survey

Advertisement

Kolkata Feb. 27 The e-Choupal agricultural marketing model of ITC Ltd has been mentioned in the Economic Survey 2006-07 as among the "novel private sector initiatives" aimed at improving the marketing channels in agriculture.

The Economic Survey for 2006-07 makes mention of ITC's e-Choupal as a business platform consisting of a set of organisational subsystems and interfaces connecting farmers to global markets. It states that such a common structure can be leveraged to procure/provide a host of product and services for the farmer as a producer as well as a consumer. The e-Choupal business platform consists of three layers each at different levels of geographic aggregation. Each of the layers is characterised by three key elements.

These include the infrastructure - physical or organisational - through which transactions take place, the entity orchestrating the transactions and the geographical coverage of the layer. The first layer consists of the village-level kiosks with Internet access (or e-Choupal), managed by an ITC trained local farmer - called a Sanchalak - and within walking distance of each target farmer. The relatively sparse population density in rural India justified the location of one e-Choupal per cluster of five villages.

The second layer consists of a bricks-and-mortar infrastructure called `hubs' managed by the traditional intermediary who has local knowledge/skills called a `Samyojak" in his new role and within "tractorable" distance (25-30km) of the target farmer.

More Stories on : Marketing | Economic Survey | Business Models | I T C Ltd | West Bengal

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page

Stories in this Section
Optimism on commodity exchanges unfounded

Govt defends role of commodity exchanges

Pulses de-listing downplayed

Spot rubber declines on global cues

Canal breach

Gold BeES raises Rs 100 cr

Inflation fears pull down chana, wheat

Bleak future

Pepper rises on rumours of hike in Vietnam price

Blowing hot & cold

e-Choupal, a novel pvt sector initiative: Survey