Iscon Balaji Foods' Sustainable Potato Farm Revolution: Transforming Lives, Securing Futures

If you operate the largest french fry manufacturing plant in India, you need potatoes, lots of them. For this reason, Iscon Balaji Foods Pvt Ltd, the manufacturer behind the brand 'Hungritos' has initiated a revolution in potato cultivation that has transformed the lives of over 8,000 farmers across India.

Iscon Balaji Foods (IBF) Pioneers Sustainable Farm Revolution

Eight thousand farmers, and growing. With such a huge number of potato growers associated with the company since over a decade now, India’s leading French Fries and dehydrated potato flakes maker Iscon Balaji Foods Pvt Ltd (IBF) has created a benchmark in corporate farming.

Iscon Balaji Foods is a Company with a Farmer’s Heart

The IBF farm revolution took its genesis in 2012, when potato enthusiasts and technocrats identified distress in the potato value chain. Despite being one of the leading global producers of the tuber, potato growers were not able to realize the full potential of the crop, incurring huge wastage and losing out on remuneration on grade outs.

Stepping in, IBF introduced data-driven intelligent farming to the potato growers and invested in technology, the first of its kind in the country, to use the grade outs for flakes. Simultaneously, IBF created market linkages, disseminated biotechnology-driven insights pertaining to seeds and crop management to the growers, and hedged them against market fluctuations and glut situations.

IBF Farm Revolution Sets Off Potato Growers On A New Trajectory

From handful growers in 2012, today IBF fosters over 8,000 farmers across Indian states of Gujarat, Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, West Bengal and Bihar who farm the best processing-variety potatoes.

The IBF-monitored plantations scale over 25,000 acres of land under a contract farming model, ensuring quality control and highly remunerative yields. Potato growers fostered by IBF cultivate ten types of potatoes (both of Indian and European origin) that ensure yields up to 42 tons per hectare, an ecosystem that has increased income at the farm level by 40-50%, establishing a sustainable potato value chain from farm to fork.