Assignment TakenSupply chain Management : Use of block chain trace the entire process of entire supply chain process and business model change to get more customers.

Case UnderstandingFresh Grower is Pune Based startup. Owner, Chitranjan Desai has decided to develop farm to fork concept. Currently the business model is B2C.He has chosen Pune as base city. He contracts nearby village farmers to get supply of fresh seasonal produce for his company. Following are the issue:- Resistane of farmers towards demand based partial harvesting. Convince farmers to use organic practises instead of traditional methods More than 6 hours used in farm to dining. Marketing challenge to gain more consumers as they prefer local vendors or app based daily need ordering services

BCS Solution SummaryOur consultancy firm suggests to change business model from B2C to B2C and B2B. It will help gain more orders and in turn will provide regular cashflow to farmers . Hence demand based partial harvesting will be supported by farmers. Also in order to expand into different cities, every steps needs to be traced and middle management needs to be excluded, This can be achieved through Block chain. Also manual farming harvesting, delivering and packaging consumes most of the time. AI (Artificial Intelligence) based demand predictions will help to predict the orders based on consumer behavior. Finally , collaboration with NitiAyog will help FreshFarmers to get data of farmers and collaborations with other Agritech startups .

Solution

(A) Business Model Change :- The FarmGrower model is currently B2B. Currently many restaurants are also adopting farm to table method. Hence in order to expand , the B2C models needs to be revamped to B2B and B2C.

(i) B2B    :- We will focus on restaurants and export market.   While India’s overall agricultural exports have stagnated since 2015- 16, export of organic foods has seen substantial increase, as consumers in developed markets such as UK, USA, and Canada have become more conscious of healthy diets. Export of organic foods has risen by almost 25 per cent between 2015-16 and 2016-17 from Rs 19.76 billion to Rs 24.78 billion at a time when overall farm exports grew by less than one percent from Rs 1,074.31 billion to just Rs 1,084.26 billion.  

(ii) B2C :- we will increase number of subscribers in different locations cities. We will focus on nearby cities such as pune, hyderbad, Mumbai ,etc. to expand the network.

(B) Automation of Supply chain:-  Supply Chain Management principle will be followed to enhance, predict and automate process. Design, planning, execution, control, and monitoring of supply chain activities with the objective of creating net value, building a competitive infrastructure, leveraging worldwide logistics, synchronizing supply with demand and measuring performance globally. In order to expand business to different cities, manual work needs to be automated.

(i) Block Chain based Supply chain :-the blockchain technology allows peer-to-peer transactions to take place transparently and without the need for an intermediary like a bank or a middleman in the agriculture sector. By eliminating the need for a central authority, the technology changes the way that trust is granted – instead of trusting an authority, trust is placed in cryptography and peer-to-peer architecture. It thus helps restore the trust between producers and consumers, which can reduce the transaction costs in the agri-food market.Blockchain technology, simply stated is the use of distributed databases to store information about transactions between parties. A defining feature of these databases is that they cannot be altered except without concurrence of a significant fraction of the custodians (and users) of the distributed database.This digitized agriculture platform will help in food traceability at different stages in supply chain right from farmers to production to processing to distribution. It aims to solve food safety and traceability. No corruption will be involved in the supply chain .Consumers can also trace their orders and hence gain trust in the startup.

(ii)Customer demand prediction:- Fresh Growers early calculations indicate that approx. 2.5 hours is required for manual harvesting and transport to packaging facilities. Use of AI based algorithm based on customers habits will help us predict the orders in advance and save the time. Hence time from 6 hours can be reduced substantially to 2 hours using AI based order predictions.

(iii) Use of QR codes in between the processes:-  Much like in supply chain, tracking of products using IoT devices along their value chain will help increase efficiency in transfer of orders between stakeholders, and alert stakeholders immediately of issues. Any misorders can be traced effectively and will help us to get user satisfaction ultimately leading to more subscribers in the future.

(iv) App for freshfarmers:- As consumers finds use of app more convenient than websites, freshfarmers app will be made to attract more subscribers.

(v) Use of testimonial/feedbacks in the app :- Customers are more drawn towards kart that have feedbacks. Such testimoials would encourage more users to switch from daily apps to Fresh farmers.

(C ) Collaborations and Farmers Support :-

(i) Collboarte with NitiAyog :- NitiAyog supports agri based startups. Collborating with the government agency would help us to gain access to various farmers data required to expand the business . the farmers who are registered can be contacted and contracts can be made with multiple farmers in order to expand in different cities.

(ii) Support Grass root level: - Freshfarmers will collaborate with Upstream (Input) Marketplace model (Matching Agri-input sellers to farmers) such as Agrikart , ninjakart, agrorevolution  to support farmers convince use organic farming instead of using pesticides, urea or germicide.  Fresh farmers can share such feedbacks to customers that farmers use organic methods and give fair price to farmers.  

ConclusionSupply Chain Management will help expand FreshFarmers from 1 city to a national and global market. Block chain will be used to enhance the practises of supply chain and use of Artifcial Intelligence based design and forecast will help Farm to table concept a hit

Attached File DetailsScope of SCM.PNG,