The daily transaction of orders received by Farmer Producers Organisations (FPOs) has clocked more than 2,000 on the government-promoted ONDC platform, which is the highest so far. This is despite odds such as high shipping charges. The online sales of farmers’ produce is part of the government’s hand-holding measures to help them directly connect with consumers.
“After starting the weekly webinar connecting FPOs with corporates, the push to online sales will be another initiative started by the Agriculture Ministry as part of the second phase programme after achieving formation of targeted 10,000 new FPOs,” an official source said.
On April 29, there were all time high 2,095 individual orders, on a single day, amounting to a total value of over ₹4 lakh, sources said.
Minister’s buy
Yogesh Dwivedi, CEO of Bhopal-based Madhya Bharath Consortium of FPOs, Mahaunnat Krishak Producer Company and Bastara Agro Producer Company, thanked Chhattisgarh Finance Minister Om Prakash Choudhary, who bought online over 30 products like rice, pickles, mushroom papad, mustard oil, and amla powder from FPOs on April 29, through social media posts. The Bastara FPO even requested the minister to share his feedback on the products.
Till date, a total of 8,540 FPOs from across the country have been successfully registered on ONDC and are trying to utilise the platform to the maximum to showcase and sell their agricultural produce to a wider network of buyers.
“In the changing agricultural economy, this initiative is not just a purchase, but a sign that farming is now moving out of the framework of policies and schemes and is becoming a part of the priorities of decision makers,” a senior Agriculture Ministry official said.
These FPOs sell raw, semi processed and value-added finished products and some of them even offer ready to eat products. Officials said that the higher margin that accrue to these farmer collectives through direct selling, enhances their ability to negotiate the rate for the raw produce, particularly when it is not produced by member-farmers and purchased from others.
Identify reasons
As it is mandatory to have GST number and FSSAI certification to sell through e-commerce platform, FPOs have started doing value addition of the raw produce in the rural areas, creating new job opportunities in areas like processing, packaging and logistics, officials said.
However, an expert who has been handling FPOs for a long time, said that the government needs to identify reasons as to why processors are still not ready to buy directly from FPOs and prefer the usual commission agents route. Unless those issues are addressed, the collective strength of farmers through FPOs will not translate into meaningful business, the expert added.
At a recent review meeting, Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan had asked officials handling horticulture produce to make efforts so that consumers get the produce at cheaper rates and farmers also receive better price
The minister needs to be pro-active rather than advising officials, the expert said and suggested Chouhan to help FPOs aggregate their produce under either a single brand or multiple brands or both, near large cities and towns, which are the consuming centres, so that the shipping charges get reduced.
Currently, the shipping charge is too high to motivate consumers buy the produce of FPOs even if they want. For instance, if 2 kg of aromatic rice from a Chhattisgarh-based FPO costs Rs 130, the shipping charge at a Delhi address shows Rs 333 on an ONDC platform. Besides, the order from the cart gets automatically removed when one tries to confirm it if there is no delivery partner available to pick up the product from seller’s destination, experts said.
Further, in most of the produce sold by FPOs on My Store, there is no provision for return, whereas in platforms like Amazon, consumers are normally allowed to cancel or return the products.
Published on May 2, 2025
