ITC eChoupal Experience

My Presentation Scope

 While the canvas for discussion is very broad, I

will limit myself to share with you few principles of
eChoupal that enabled its deployment at
grassroot to become

• Sustainable

• Scalable
ITC eChoupal

A Quick Look
 The eChoupal Services
 Relevant & Real-time Information
• Commodity prices, Local Weather, News

 Customised Knowledge
• Farm Management, Risk Management

 Supply Chain for Farm Inputs

• Screened for Quality, Demand Aggregation for Competitive
Prices & Efficient Logistics

 Direct Marketing Channel for Farm Produce

• Lower Transaction Costs, Better Value through Traceability
Other Services through eChoupal

 Distribution of Products and Services to Rural

Markets

 Micro marketing
• Product/Services Demos
• Marketing and Brand Building activities

 Pilots
• Bhoomi
• eHealth with Private Health Service Providers
• eEducation
• Rural BPO
 Current Network Size
State Choupals Hubs

Madhya Pradesh 1750 43

Uttar Pradesh 1750 42

Maharashtra 900 22

Rajasthan 500 15

Karnataka 100 2

Andhra Pradesh 150 3

Choupals 5,150 127

Villages 31,000

Farmers 3,500,000

Adding Six New Choupals Every Day

Intend Scaling up to 100,000 Villages in 15 States by 2010
Deployment Principles
 #1 Co Creation
 End-to-end solution is designed collaboratively
• Identify major problems and
• solve them with efficiency and transparency

 When we started, it was with a FMCG approach, with

reliance on
• Market Research
• Focus Groups

… and then the approach quickly changed to

‘Prototypes’ to enable experience and obtain feedback
• An iterative approach to build models to solve the real world
problems of the Individual and of the Community
Solution : Access to Price Information – Anytime & In the
Village
Solution : Transparency and Accuracy in Weighment
Solution : Modern Methods for Quality Assessment
 #2 Must have a well thought out
Business Model
 Who Pays ?

 Who Runs ?

 Who Monitors Quality?

 What are the Value Propositions to the Stake

Holders ?
 The ITC eChoupal Proposition
 Step 1: Leveraging ICTs for empowered access to
markets (inputs & outputs)

 Step 2: Economic viability of IT infrastructure

investments is justified through Win-Win business
models, hence also scaleable

 Step 3: Customer responsive IT infrastructure in

the villages facilitates access to supplementary
Education, Health, Employment, eGovernance
services
 ICTs make it possible !
 The eChoupal Price Discovery : Farmer @ Receiving
End Vs Empowered
• Value through Unbundling what was bundled together earlier
(Information & Transaction)
– Unbundles
– Price information is now available at the door step without a necessity
to go to mandi
– Has an option to fix price at the village itself. However, at the time of
selling, still retains the freedom to go to mandi if he believes he gets
better offer there.

 The Input Transaction

• Value through Bundling (Information, Knowledge, Transaction)
what was available unbundled earlier
– Bundles
– Information on Weather and Best Practices from the website
– Knowledge of ‘what to do’ from the Experts
– Efficient supply platform for inputs purchase that enables aggregation
and scale efficiencies
 #3 The Orchestrator
 Who Orchestrates the multiple entities?
• The scale and complexity inherent makes it a high
maintenance network

 The Orchestrator has to ensure

• There is a ‘Big Picture’ to what is initiated
• ‘Changing Needs’ are tracked and are efficiently
responded
• ‘Continuous Innovation’ of the business model is
ensured for its long term relevance
 #4 The Infrastructure

 Must have Three Tiers

• Local part for Responsiveness

• Regional level for Controlling

• Apex element for Resources Allocation

 3 X 3 eChoupal Infrastructure
 ICT Kiosk with Internet Access
• In the house of one trained farmer, Sanchalak
• Within walking distance of target farmers Link

 Warehousing Hub / Store

• Managed by the erstwhile middleman, Samyojak
• Within tractorable distance of target farmers Link

 Collaborative Network of Companies

• Orchestrated by ITC
• With a Pan-Indian presence Link
 #5 Capability Building
 Build Customer Orientation right across the Chain
• “Customer is the reason”

 … and also the necessary Functional and Process skills

• Working Capital
• Demand Creation / assessment

 … along with the Soft Skills

• Feedback
• Quality / Customer Service
Taking ICTs & Biz Models to
Rural India

Training
Taking ICTs & Biz Models to
Rural India

Power Connectivity

Website
 ITC Limited

eChoupal Sagar
Thank You
 Thank You

visit www.itcportal.com for more details on ITC eChoupal