NEW DELHI, 16 October 2020: As part of its value-added embedded fintech services program for dairies and dairy farmers, the leading dairy-tech startup Stellapps has launched a first of its kind fully automated Digital Direct Farmers Payment product for Dairy Cooperatives, called “mooPay” in Bhilwara district of Rajasthan.
The app was launched on 15 October in the presence of the Chairman Ramlal Jat of Bhilwara Dairy Union (Saras), under whose visionary leadership this project has been executed.
Also present were the entire board of directors of the Union, L.K. Jain, Advisor to the union, the MD Asha Sharma and Rajendra Udawat P&I Incharge.
Stellapps’ Direct Farmer Payment fintech solution mooPay acts as a payment gateway for dairies to make payments on the click of a single button to every registered farmer in a matter of seconds, completely removing the risks and costs of transferring money to lakh of farmers in hundreds of villages.
The mooPay FinTech solutions will bring transparency and cost savings due to the digitization of the milk value chain. It also enables dairies to transparently get information on each member farmer and their income. This data was previously unavailable and at best restricted to Milk Cooperative Societies or milk aggregator agents at the village level. It also enables transparency of quantity and quality of milk in the supply chain and thus farmers can efficiently realize the money for milk poured directly into their bank accounts. It is a big step towards realizing the Stellapps vision of converting milk into a ‘real-time’ currency for smallholder farmers, to help them through stressful situations.
Stellapps mooPay system enables an automated digital payment solution which helps the dairy officials to transfer the milk payments digitally to member farmers from the dairies existing bank account to that of the farmers saving bank account. mooPay systems will automatically fetch milk payment data from the IoT devices deployed at every village dairy cooperative society which capture the milk pouring of every farmer.
Instant digital payment is the new reality for people all across the country but not for rural dairy farmers. In the milk value chain, transactions predominantly have been in cash and there are no formal records of individual farmers’ income. The transfer of money often takes 10-15 days and the quality check is done manually but Stellapps is set to change this for Bhilwara dairy union. The money will be credited directly to the farmer bank accounts.
The company has also installed display units at the centres that will show the quality, quantity and price of the milk of individual farmers and incentivize production of quality milk.
Ramlal Jat, Chairman of Bhilwara dairy union said, “Stellapps has helped us bridge the gap between the farmers and the dairy union and increased transparency. Online payment enabled by Stellapps has also helped us reduce cost and eliminate the risk of COVID transmission during transactions.”
“Directly depositing payments in farmers’ bank accounts helps enhance farmer savings and this, in turn, builds farmer loyalty to the dairy. With the help of Stellapps solutions we are also able to ensure quality linked pricing for farmer produce and thus stay competitive,” MD of Bhilwara union Asha Sharma said.
Stellapps' Strategic Accounts Director Ajay Pareek who has been working closely with the Bhilwara Union said, “This is a ‘Kurien’ moment in the history of the milk industry and revival of the relationship between the Union, Society and Farmers. This would enable the cooperative structure to integrate with its members in a more transparent and interactive manner.”
Adding further, Pareek said, “The greatest need of milk-producing farmers is a profitable and vibrant Union. This moment will make the Union more profitable than ever. mooPay will help the Union to efficiently deliver its development and field extension funds to needy Farmers. The overall impact will help accelerate the efforts of our government for Increased sustainable farmer incomes and better livestock. The use of IoT technology in the Dairy industry is the need of the hour and I will request GoI, GoR, Dept Of AHD and NDDB to use this technology for the benefits of farmers.”
Stellapps CEO of FinTech and Value Added Services Rahul Mallick remarked, “This is a big step for Indian dairy cooperatives. Enabling direct digital payments to farmer bank accounts not only helps improve financial inclusion and economic empowerment of farmers but also facilitates the design and delivery of innovative data-based farmer beneficiary programmes. Such innovations will help us achieve the government’s vision of doubling farmers’ income by 2022”.
How does it work
For making transactions easier for farmers, The company has also set up customer service points at the centres itself where farmers can show their Aadhar card and withdraw the money from their accounts. They can also visit their nearest Post office and withdraw the money or someone from the Post Office can come to their house and give them the money.
Stellapps mooPay had won the India FinTech Forum’s prestigious Financial Inclusion Initiative of the year award for 2019.
Apart from direct digital farmer payments, mooPay enables delivery of cattle loans, livestock insurance and innovative fintech solutions like sachet loans, milk receivable financing.
The World Economic Forum Technology Pioneer had also bagged the Sustainable Ag Asia award, Singapore by Rabobank Foundation and the Agriculture InsureTech Award by GIIF, World Bank.
