C-CAMP Launches Agriculture Grand Challenge-2 for Start-ups Across India: Apply Before the Last Date

In an exciting initiative to encourage innovation in agriculture, C-CAMP's Centre of Excellence for Agri Innovation, supported by Ktech, has unveiled the Agriculture Grand Challenge-2. Launched at the Bengaluru Tech Summit 2023 on December 1, 2023, the program aims to invite start-ups from across India to address key challenges in the agriculture and allied sectors.

The application process for the Agriculture Grand Challenge-2 is now open, with interested start-ups encouraged to apply before January 31, 2024, for a chance to secure an investment ranging from ₹25-50 lakh. The challenge presents problem statements categorized into two groups: agriculture and allied.

In the agriculture category, the focus is on leveraging technology to enhance shelf life and reduce post-harvest losses. Additionally, the challenge calls for innovations in plant pest and disease detection, monitoring, and mitigation, with a special emphasis on target crops such as tomato, pomegranate, cotton, and coffee. Another critical area is technology for on-site drying and grading of cash crops.

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The animal husbandry/allied group invites solutions for novel artificial insemination techniques for cattle, with the goal of improving fertilization rates. Furthermore, the challenge seeks the development of cost-effective on-farm pregnancy detection kits for cattle, capable of detecting PAB/AGA/other hormones. Innovations in affordable farmer-level mastitis detection and fast, accurate methods for detecting contaminants in milk are also on the agenda.

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Eligible participants must adhere to specific criteria: the start-up should be registered in India, be less than 10 years old, and the beneficiary must be an Indian start-up (not applicable to Indian subsidiaries of MNCs/foreign companies). Additionally, at least 51% shareholding by Indian promoters in the beneficiary start-up is required. Start-ups must focus on developing deep-tech/deep-science solutions tailored to the defined problem statements. The selected start-ups will have the opportunity to be incubated at C-CAMP and are expected to develop and deploy a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) within 18 months.

The application process is straightforward and can be accessed through the provided link: http://tinyurl.com/ymruv4xs.

This initiative underscores a concerted effort to drive technological advancements in agriculture and allied sectors, providing a platform for start-ups to contribute groundbreaking solutions to critical challenges in the industry.

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