Startups Use Digital Innovation to Improve Living Standards of Farmers, Fishers

Digital innovation in the agriculture sector is needed to improve the living standards of farmers and fishers in Indonesia since many of them still live below the poverty line.

Pahlawan Digital UMKM (MSME Digital Heroes) on a talk show with the theme “Promising Digital Agribusiness MSMEs”, Thursday (09/15), featured two digital startups working to overcome this issue, namely Crowde and Aruna Indonesia.

“We enjoy the yields of farmers every day. Our agricultural product consumption continues to increase, but farmers in rural areas face more hardship. They have to rely on middlemen. We want to solve this issue,” Chief Operating Officer of Crowde Andrew Tobing said.

According to Andrew, Crowde creates technology to provide access to financing for Indonesian farmers, connects farmers directly to the agricultural market and consumers, and aggregates agricultural data.

Meanwhile, Aruna Indonesia connects fishers directly to both domestic and global markets and assists the fishers it fosters to sell their catches online.

“With our technology, we ensure that fishers’ catches are sent directly to consumers and their income increases,” Head of Public Policy and Government Relations of Aruna Indonesia Elkana Lewerissa said.

For the record, Pahlawan Digital UMKM is a competition run by the Ministry of Cooperatives and MSMEs and Cabinet Secretariat to find young innovators and startups for accelerating MSMEs’ digital transformation.

As many as 10 winners will be partners of the Ministry of Cooperatives and MSMEs in various MSME digitalization programs, get rewards of hundreds of million rupiahs, and network with venture capitals and other financing institutions.

The registration for Pahlawan Digital UMKM is open for all digital innovators and startups working in food and beverage, fashion and textile as well as agritech sectors until September 26.

For further information on the registration, please visit https://pahlawandigitalumkm.setkab.go.id/ or @pahlawandigitalumkm and @kemenkopukm on Instagram. (Office of Presidential Staff/ AIT) (DH/MMB)