Our fundamental belief is
99.99 percent of human beings are honest,
trustworthy and creditworthy.
If they have not been able to honour their commitment of repaying,
it could be on account of situations or circumstances which are beyond their control.
And as a financier, as a lender, we feel that,
it is our responsibilty to understand the risks associated with the cashflows
and how do we de-risk the person who is to pay us from those risks.
The average landholding of a smallholder farmer in India is less than a hectare.
By nature, it is fragmented landholding.
So, the only way to aggregate the landholding, is by aggregating people.
The farmer collectives have been able to add value to their members,
if they had two things:
One: access to finance,
and two: having an entity that works with them as a partner
in what we refer to as the AMLA approach.
Not just restrict yourself to finance,
but go beyond finance as an internal player in the value chain.
Let me explain you about Samunnati's activities through a success story.
The customer's name is Valli.
She couldn't get any credit support from the national banks.
I have two childeren. We were struggling hard.
Before, I was a daily wage worker.
I didn't have the resources to do farming on our land, we left it barren.
Then, the FPO was formed, to find a solution for our finance needs.
Through that I got a loan from Samunnati.
They gave the loan when we needed it.
Using the crop loan, we cultivated our land.
And then, we don't stop with the credit support,
since the AMLA approach includes the advisory services and market linkages,
through community based organisations.
Now, we are doing proper farming.
Before, we just copied whatever the nearby farmer was doing. It was like that.
Now, after joining the FPO,
our soil gets tested to see which nutrients the particular land has
and they advice us on which crops are most suitable for cultivation.
They have their own processing unit,
they process here,
and they value add that commodity,
so that they are able to give a good profit margin to the farmer.
Only because of this growth, I was able to give my children good education.
And, now I am giving work to ten people.
Everyone, everyone in our society should be able to grow... That is my wish.
If we walk around the villages where Samunnati has been operational for about 4 years,
you would invariably see a lot of activity.
Now, people have started getting into processing,
people have started getting into local networks in terms of selling their produce to the local geopraphies.
People have started getting into local branding,
to be able to produce the additional delta on their processed food.
So on and so forth.
All this was latent, all this was inherent.
It was very much inside, but...
it needed a catalyst like Samunnati,
it needed a catalyst like providing market linkages and financial access,
which is what we provided.