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Climate risk management firm Weather Risk Management Services Pvt Ltd (WRMS) plans to approach 30 lakh farmers across 150 districts in 2017 to connect them with the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Beema Yojana (the Prime Minister’s Crop Insurance Scheme).
Last year, the company had approached about 15 lakh farmers, encouraging them to opt for crop insurance.
The company, which offers a range of services for the farm sector and acts as an advisor, aggregator and facilitator, has served over 10 lakh farmers across 40 districts so far, Sonu Agrawal, Founder and Managing Director, told BusinessLine .
“Basically, we persuade the farmers to opt for crop insurance so as to minimise risk in the event of any untoward happenings to their crop,” he said. The firm plans to approach a total of 30 lakh farmers in the forthcoming kharif and rabi seasons.
Agrawal, an alumnus of IIT-Kanpur and IIM-Calcutta, said his company aims to improve farmers’ lives by managing and protecting their crop from diseases, guiding them to get the best yields and train them in contributing to the commodity market by forecasting weather and crop yield estimates.
Last year, UPL Ltd had acquired a 26 per cent stake in WRMS for ₹10 crore.
Weather Risk Management Services (WRMS), founded in 2004, is a climate risk management company with a footprint that spans India, Africa and Asia. It pioneered the development of the weather insurance market in India and has bailed out about five lakh disaster-hit farmers through weather insurance. “Our mission is to make 2 crore farmers secure a daily income of two dollars each and ensure universal access to weather insurance for people of Asia, Africa and the Americas.” He said that WRMS is primarily engaged in providing agriculture risk management solutions, including weather information and forecast services, agriculture decision-support system services, precision farming services and crop insurance products for farmers.
Its objective is to provide security against climate change using data, technology and innovation. Besides agriculture, it works in an interdisciplinary ecosystem of climatology, meteorology, Nano-sciences, financial engineering, computer science and electronics, atmospheric physics and industrial design.
With a view to increase farmers’ income, WRMS has launched pilot services such as plant and soil doctors to diagnose diseases. “We are also planning to introduce drones for data collection and analysis.”
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