WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.360 --> 00:00:03.110 (dramatic music) 2 00:00:04.101 --> 00:00:07.050 (lively music) 3 00:00:07.050 --> 00:00:11.640 There are 525 million smallholder farmers in the world. 4 00:00:11.640 --> 00:00:15.330 These farmers produce 70% of the world's food 5 00:00:15.330 --> 00:00:18.690 and yet are among the poorest people on the planet. 6 00:00:18.690 --> 00:00:23.220 Jiva is a profit-for-purpose venture that BCG X launched 7 00:00:23.220 --> 00:00:25.140 in collaboration with Olam, 8 00:00:25.140 --> 00:00:28.230 one of the world's leading agribusinesses. 9 00:00:28.230 --> 00:00:30.900 Jiva's purpose is to uplift the livelihoods 10 00:00:30.900 --> 00:00:35.900 of these farmers by providing them access to inputs, credit. 11 00:00:36.150 --> 00:00:38.580 We're providing them a market for their outputs 12 00:00:38.580 --> 00:00:42.033 and by giving them good advice to improve their yields. 13 00:00:43.770 --> 00:00:46.440 Olam is a global supply chain manager 14 00:00:46.440 --> 00:00:48.150 of agricultural commodities. 15 00:00:48.150 --> 00:00:50.490 It operates in more than 60 countries and 16 00:00:50.490 --> 00:00:55.200 it has 70,000 employees. We had a very clear vision 17 00:00:55.200 --> 00:00:59.130 that Jiva should impact positively 18 00:00:59.130 --> 00:01:00.963 these smallholder farmers' lives. 19 00:01:01.860 --> 00:01:03.330 BCG X was involved right 20 00:01:03.330 --> 00:01:06.900 from day one of conceptualizing this idea with Olam. 21 00:01:06.900 --> 00:01:09.630 We started with in-field interviews with farmers 22 00:01:09.630 --> 00:01:13.050 from India, Indonesia, Africa 23 00:01:13.050 --> 00:01:15.600 to really understand their pain points. 24 00:01:15.600 --> 00:01:17.310 And this uncovered pain points 25 00:01:17.310 --> 00:01:20.790 such as access to credit, lack of knowledge, 26 00:01:20.790 --> 00:01:24.450 access to markets, price transparency and so forth. 27 00:01:24.450 --> 00:01:27.150 BCG X helped us conduct the research 28 00:01:27.150 --> 00:01:29.550 and subsequently helped us validate 29 00:01:29.550 --> 00:01:32.610 and build the hypothesis for the business, 30 00:01:32.610 --> 00:01:35.190 and subsequently commercialize the business. 31 00:01:35.190 --> 00:01:38.130 They helped us build the technology platform, 32 00:01:38.130 --> 00:01:41.760 which is what Jiva's current tech platform is built on. 33 00:01:41.760 --> 00:01:44.340 They also helped through crafting the strategy 34 00:01:44.340 --> 00:01:45.707 and also the go-to-market approach 35 00:01:45.707 --> 00:01:46.920 for this business. 36 00:01:46.920 --> 00:01:48.090 To put it all together, 37 00:01:48.090 --> 00:01:50.220 they were able to help us recruit the team, 38 00:01:50.220 --> 00:01:53.370 which forms even today the core of the leadership team 39 00:01:53.370 --> 00:01:56.670 of Jiva and since has been able to build an organization 40 00:01:56.670 --> 00:01:58.620 of about 500 people today. 41 00:01:58.620 --> 00:01:59.910 Once we are convinced 42 00:01:59.910 --> 00:02:03.060 that this is an idea that we could invest in, BCG helped us 43 00:02:03.060 --> 00:02:08.060 in building this into a prototype and a working model 44 00:02:08.850 --> 00:02:12.720 by bringing together a team of designers, technologists, 45 00:02:12.720 --> 00:02:15.000 product specialists, venture architects, 46 00:02:15.000 --> 00:02:17.610 and an overall GM to run this program 47 00:02:17.610 --> 00:02:19.230 to take it to a stage 48 00:02:19.230 --> 00:02:22.530 where Olam could then employ dedicated people 49 00:02:22.530 --> 00:02:24.510 to take over from BCG X. 50 00:02:24.510 --> 00:02:27.420 We've been able to substantially scale the business 51 00:02:27.420 --> 00:02:29.880 since we launched the product in March of 2021. 52 00:02:31.049 --> 00:02:34.380 In the last year, we transacted with close to 12,000 farmers 53 00:02:34.380 --> 00:02:36.180 and this year, we've been able to scale that to close 54 00:02:36.180 --> 00:02:37.980 to 70,000 farmers. 55 00:02:37.980 --> 00:02:40.860 And that has translated to a business revenue 56 00:02:40.860 --> 00:02:45.860 of growing from $17 million to about $75 million this year. 57 00:02:46.620 --> 00:02:48.510 We've also made an impact in terms of incomes 58 00:02:48.510 --> 00:02:49.470 to these farmers. 59 00:02:49.470 --> 00:02:52.380 Their incomes have increased by almost 25%. 60 00:02:52.380 --> 00:02:54.360 Farmers who followed our advisory 61 00:02:54.360 --> 00:02:57.630 through our digital AI-backed platform 62 00:02:57.630 --> 00:03:01.293 have improved their incomes by almost 50%. 63 00:03:01.293 --> 00:03:03.360 Jiva has made a phenomenal start. 64 00:03:03.360 --> 00:03:05.668 In its first market of South Sulawesi [Indonesia], 65 00:03:05.668 --> 00:03:07.980 it has reached over 60,000 farmers 66 00:03:07.980 --> 00:03:10.417 and market shares of 30% in some of their target areas. 67 00:03:11.842 --> 00:03:13.492 They are now in scale-up 68 00:03:13.492 --> 00:03:15.810 and have launched a pilot program in India, 69 00:03:15.810 --> 00:03:16.860 which gives them access 70 00:03:16.860 --> 00:03:19.920 to 140 million farmers who can benefit 71 00:03:19.920 --> 00:03:21.720 from their services. 72 00:03:21.720 --> 00:03:26.160 Looking back, BCG X has helped create a real-world solution 73 00:03:26.160 --> 00:03:27.983 that can have global impact. 74 00:03:27.983 --> 00:03:30.650 (lively music)