Agri-food startup qualifies for UN Accelerator Programme
FarmersFZ figures among 12 agri-food startups in the accelerator programme by the Food and Agriculture Organisation.
The startup ecosystem in Kerala is buoyant that ever before, and the arena has been seeing much significant developments of late. The latest on that front is the achievement that an agri-startup from the state has pocketed.
Farmers Fresh Zone, also known as FarmersFZ, the startup, has been selected for the Accelerator programme by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), figuring on a list of 12 agri-food startups around the world for the UN body to develop business.
Agri-food startup is one of the two from India to qualify
The Kochi-based multichannel marketplace platform is one among India’s two startups to qualify for the Accelerator programme that ultimately aims to attain the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Pradeep PS, the CEO of the 2016-founded AgriTech D2C, will attend the pertinent UN function at Rome next month.
FarmersFZ functions under the Kerala Startup Mission (KSUM), which is the nodal agency of the Kerala government for entrepreneurship development and incubation activities in the state.
The startup won the FAO recognition for its Sustainable Way of Doing Business model, which is low on carbon emission and does not waste food by implementing the principle of Farm to Fork as Saas, promoting regional production and consumption.
FarmersFZ picked for the world body’s SEED Low Carbon Awards
According to Pradeep, the UN programme will enable the agri-food startup FarmersFZ to present its model before countries across continents. “The model would require alterations based on the nature of the markets in each economy. For that we need funds, which will come through the Accelerator,” he noted.
The UN had earlier considered FarmersFZ for the world body’s SEED Low Carbon Awards. FarmersFZ, which bridges the gap between rural farmers and urban consumers by providing healthy, premium-quality and pesticide-free vegetables from fields to the table within 24 hours of harvest, connects more than three lakh consumers and 2,000-plus farmers in Kerala.
