Mumbai, July 9, 2020: Both Bayer and 

CInI have a long legacy of significant work to enable prosperity for India’s rural farming communities. For Indian agriculture to unlock its true potential, smallholder farmers need to be fast tracked towards economic growth through sustainable farm incomes. It also requires agri-entrepreneurship to promote self-reliance and generate employment for rural farming communities. To act upon these shared objectives, Bayer CropScience Limited is partnering with CInI (Collectives for Integrated Livelihood Initiatives), an associate organization of Tata Trusts.

Bayer leads a global, multi-stakeholder initiative called ‘Better Life Farming’ (BLF), which operates in India as an alliance between Bayer, IFC (World Bank Group), Netafim, Yara Fertilisers, DeHaat, Big Basket and AgriBazaar. BLF focuses on equipping smallholder farmers with modern agricultural technologies. It also promotes agri-entrepreneurship through BLF centers, which provide access to multi-brand agri inputs, crop advisory and market linkages. These centers are owned and operated either by a Farmer Producer Organization (FPO), Federation, agri-graduate or a local farmer/entrepreneur. Each BLF center covers a group of 500 farmers from five to six villages nearby and doubles up as a center for aggregation and sale of farm produce. The centers also operate model farms to share good agricultural practices around crop nutrition, micro-irrigation technologies, mulching etc., and demonstrate safe handling of seed & crop protection products.

CInI with key support from Tata Trusts, leads the ‘Mission 2020 – Lakhpati Kisan: Smart Villages’ initiative that runs across Jharkhand, Odisha, Maharashtra and Gujarat. This project aims to help farmers earn over Rs.1,00,000 per annum and serve the rural poor through an integrated livelihood approach that enhances both day-to-day quality of life and overall standards of living.

With the partnership, CInI will be closely involved in Bayer’s BLF initiative that currently supports 80,000 smallholder farmers and 78 BLF centers in Uttar Pradesh and Jharkhand. Bayer plans to open 40+ BLF centers in areas covered under CInI programs and support Farmer Producer Companies to improve the financial & operational management of their farming business. Further, Bayer will support CInI in its Lakhpati Kisan initiatives. Through their joint interventions, Bayer and CInI aim to improve rural livelihoods through market-oriented interventions and a focus on self-reliant agri-entrepreneurship, with a special focus on economically and socially empowering women smallholders as producers and entrepreneurs.

“Bayer is committed to support smallholder farmers to help them increase crop yields & farm incomes and move from subsistence farming to commercial farming. To achieve this, we are collaborating with partners to maximize value created for smallholder farmers,” said D Narain, MD & CEO, Bayer CropScience Limited. “Bayer has worked closely with CInI for capacity building for smallholder farmers in resource poor geographies. With our partnership, we want to strengthen agri-entrepreneurship and help smallholder farmers earn sustainable farm incomes,” added D Narain.

“CInI’s Lakhpati Kisan initiative has achieved notable impact in creating vibrant community institutions and demand-led interventions for the promotion of rural livelihoods. Bayer’s Better Life Farming initiative fits our mission and purpose and will help us bring about irreversible change for rural farming communities through economic empowerment and a better quality of life,” said Burzis Taraporevala, President of CInI.

Bayer and CInI have already set up two BLF centers: one at Narsingh Diha, Bahraich in Uttar Pradesh and another at Churchu, Hazaribagh in Jharkhand. The center in Jharkhand has been set up with M/s Churchu Nari Urja Farmer Producer Company Ltd., a registered FPC promoted by CInI under its Lakhpati Kisan Smart Village initiative.

About Bayer

Bayer is a global enterprise with core competencies in the life science fields of health care and nutrition. Its products and services are designed to benefit people by supporting efforts to overcome the major challenges presented by a growing and aging global population. At the same time, the Group aims to increase its earning power and create value through innovation and growth. Bayer is committed to the principles of sustainable development, and the Bayer brand stands for trust, reliability and quality throughout the world. In fiscal 2019, the Group employed around 104,000 people and had sales of € 43.5 billion. Capital expenditures amounted to € 2.9 billion and R&D expenses to € 5.3 billion.
For more information, go to www.bayer.com.

Media Contact

Saswati Panigrahi
Communications, Bayer CropScience Limited
E-mail: saswati.panigrahi@bayer.com

Forward-Looking Statements

This release may contain forward-looking statements based on current assumptions and forecasts made by Bayer management. Various known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors could lead to material differences between the actual future results, financial situation, development or performance of the company and the estimates given here. These factors include those discussed in Bayer’s public reports, which are available on the Bayer website at www.bayer.com. The company assumes no liability whatsoever to update these forward-looking statements or to conform them to future events or developments.