September 9: Rapid Organic Pvt ltd added one more jewel to its collection of achievements when its director Yogesh Joshi received the prestigious Award for Excellence at International Glory Awards 2021 held in Goa last week for his contribution in promoting & producing Organic farm Products. VConnect Star organized the summit. The budding entrepreneur received honours from the well-known actor Sonu Sood.
Mr. Yogeshhad worked day and night to tap the global market demand for organic food by increasing its indigenous production. He started his own company Rapid Organic Pvt. Ltd., in 2010. Now Rapid Organic is a milestone in the sector of Organic Food. Being in the agriculture and farming business for more than 11 years, Yogesh Joshi, an expert in the field, has come to the rescue of millions by offering training to hundreds of farmers and helping them with the equipment they require for their land. Starting from seven farmers initially, today, Yogesh is successfully working with more than 15000 farmers with a huge annual turnover.
People are turning more health-conscious. Be it air or food. We need things in the purest form. This is why people are turning towards organically cultivated food products instead of conventionally grown farm produce. However, in India, organic farming is still nascent as farmers are unaware of its benefits and are reluctant to forgo their age-old traditional methods.
Hailing from the Jalore district of Rajasthan, Yogesh cultivates spices, pulses, oilseeds, cereals, superfoods (Quinoa & Chia) etc., with his contracted farmers. Yogesh developed many farmer projects and clusters. Mr. Yogesh also developed his own FPOs and directly working with farmers. He contracted with many MNC and Export food companies for crop production and backward integration. He is legally contracting with farmers for organic crop production and providing them 100% buyback. Mr. Yogesh also does timely CSR activities with farmers like medicine camps, academic help etc.
The company Rapid organic is the brainchild of Yogesh. He had built the company with a vision to propagate the advantages of organic farming and uplift fellow farmers’ financial position in his region by undertaking this profitable and entirely risk-free method of agriculture. Interestingly, this young farmer from Jalore district in the princely state of Rajasthan with a small landholding of mere 2 acres started his organic establishment facing opposition from every nuke and corner. His company then collaborated with more than seven farmers and started its production. However, the company faced loss in the first year even after producing a highly profitable cash crop, Cumin, a cash crop, as its first organic production. Lack of experience, technical guidance, and smallholding of land was the main reason for the initial losses.
Yogesh Joshi then teamed up with agricultural scientists at CAZRI (Central Arid Zone Research Institute), who further trained more farmers in the neighbourhood. The result was overwhelming after three years. It should be noted that it takes almost three years to become a certified organic farmer and the agricultural land then gets a complete certification after the first successful production.
Since then, there has been no looking back for the organization. Numbers are continuously rising from a turnover of 10 lakhs in the initial stage to 65 crores in 2020. Today the company is working with around 15000 farmers. Among them, 3000 are already certified, and 12000 are under conversion process, i.e., some of them are in their first year, and some are in their second or third year of the certification process.
According to Yogesh, “Rapid Organic has a fantastic working portfolio. The policies and agreements are farmer-centric. It guarantees a 100% buyback offer of his produce on an agreed price that will always be more than the prevailing market price. Additionally, Rapid Organic Pvt. Ltd. also provides technical support to the enrolled farmers from training to logistic support to availing those organic pesticides for production, etc.”