Continuing in its endeavour to bring prosperity into the lives of farmers, Tata Chemicals Ltd. today announced the launch of ‘Tata Kisan Sansar’, a chain of one-stop resource centres. This unique initiative for farmers, the Tata Kisan Sansar, will benefit farmers by offering end-to-end agri solutions including the latest in agro services and specialized input products. The service ranging from agro input planning to crop procurement, will assist farmers in their decision making process to increase their yield and align themselves to market demands.

An upgraded set-up of the existing Tata Kisan Kendras, the Tata Kisan Sansar (TKS) is a unique initiative that will benefit farmers by enabling easy access to the latest techniques and modern farming concepts, which otherwise is not easily accessible to Indian farmers. Spanning three highly productive agricultural states of Punjab, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana, TKS will provide solutions to over 14,000 villages in Northern India in its first phase. 

The key benefits provided by TKS to a farmer include easy access to the market and facilitate long term, low interest credit by becoming a part of self-help group called Kisan Sahyog Pariwars (KSP). Pilot projects of the KSP have already been successfully rolled out in 256 villages. The company has trained agronomists to directly interact with the farmers for total agriculture related solutions. The company has over 130 highly skilled agronomists that constantly track and bring the best agro-practises to the farmers in the three states. 

Announcing the launch of TKS, Mr Prasad Menon, Managing Director, Tata Chemicals Ltd said, “This developmental initiative forms a part of the Tata Group philosophy of concentrating on areas of national economic significance. It is the manifestation of the group’s belief that rural India can grow enormously, given a little impetus from the private sector companies such as Tata Chemicals. TKS will act as the business partner and advisor to farmers by providing the entire range of agro services to them. It will create a favourable environment (Sansar) for the farmers, to help them increase their yield thereby bringing prosperity in their lives. We have commenced our initiative with 421 TKS spanning three agricultural dense states of the North and we hope to expand our reach by 500 outlets by 2005.”

With the objective to help the farmer increase his yield through informed decision making, the company will be setting up kiosks at all key locations to enable easy and real time access to the information required by a farmer such as Mandi prices amongst others. TKS centres will also be IT enabled and will track the profile of farmers visiting the centres. Through this the company will improve its response time and service the farmer more efficiently. Apart from this, TKS will extend the output buyback service (contract farming) that has already benefited farmers in 60 villages of UP and Punjab. Besides this, TKS will continue to provide other farm management solutions as well. 

Establishing the genesis of TKS, Mr. Kapil Mehan, COO, Fertiliser Business, Tata Chemicals Ltd. said, “While addressing the agro input needs of farmers through our Tata Kisan Kendra’s (TKK), we realized that there is a huge requirement by farmers for agriculture related solutions across all areas. With TKS we will offer end-to-end agro solutions through our resource centres thereby adding value to farmers’ life. To create a clear branding differentiation in TKS, a new logo is being unveiled today and the entire look and feel of the resource centres will be centred on this new identity. The new logo will capture the essence of our offerings and convey the holistic approach to this initiative.” 

To avail TKS services, a farmer can either become a member of Tata Kisan Pariwar or pay selectively for the services. 

About Tata Chemicals:
Established in 1939, Tata Chemicals ltd (TCL) is India’s leading manufacturer of inorganic chemicals, fertilizers and food additives. Part of this Rs. 65,000 crore (US$ 14.25 billion) Tata Group, the company owns and operates the largest integrated inorganic chemical complex in the country at Mithapur, Gujarat. The company’s state-of-the-art fertiliser complex at Babrala, Uttar Pradesh is known for its world-class energy efficiency standards, and has won several awards in the fields of environmental conservation, community development and safety. TCL’s phosphatic fertiliser complex at Haldia in west Bengal is currently the only manufacturing unit for DAP/NPK complexes in west Bengal. The company has an annual turnover of Rs 2, 500 crore and employs close to 3,500 personnel.