World Bank, India: April 2015 – Sep 2022: Been a part of the Bank’s task team, as Agribusiness Specialist, in three of the projects in the states of Maharashtra, Himachal Pradesh and Assam. My focus areas were on a) improving market access for farm produce under the project, b) modernizing marketing systems including electronic bidding for greater transparency in price discovery processes, c) process automation improving speed and accuracy of data recording, c) warehouse receipt financing to enable farmer delayed sale for a better price, d) reforms in regulations and market practices towards achieving fair trade regime in an ecosystem where market powers firmly rest with the trade and e) FPO/FPC institution building.

Grant Thornton, India: Oct 2021- Sept 2022: As Value chain Specialist and CO Team Leader to develop horticulture development in Himachal Pradesh for a project to be funded by Asian Development Bank, aimed at promoting subtropical fruit plantations, enhancing incomes of farmers of the lower areas of the state.

Jan 2020- Dec 2020: Engaged as Agri Economist and Value chain Specialist for an assignment to advise Asian Development Bank in structuring a new project for development of horticulture crops in Maharashtra, aimed at reducing post harvest losses, strengthening Farmer Associations and better value capture for farmers. In both these projects introduced the concept of Anchor or Apex FPO to provide business leadership for FPOs, allowing individual FPOs to focus on production/aggregation as suppliers and the Apex handles business strategy and execution, permitting the FPOs to achieve scale jointly instead of each individually going to market.

Ernest n Young, India: May 2018 – March 2019: EY are the transaction advisor to the e-National Agricultural Market (http://enam.gov.in/enam/) implemented by an arm of Government of India. Nearly 600 agricultural markets across the country are connected on an electronic trading and settlement system, primarily to bring about market transparency and wider market access for farmers instead of relying on buyers in a single location. My assignment under this assignment, was to enhance effectiveness of implementation of the project, identify areas that require strengthening in terms of institutional support and process improvements in all areas of ecosystem development, trade and settlement.

EA Trade and Investment Hub, Nairobi: Jan-May 2018: Consultancy assignment for evaluation of performance and future strategy formulation for e-Granary project managed by the East African Farmers Federation. e- Granary is conceptualized as a platform for supporting small farmer access to inputs under credit, crop insurance, extension advisory and in finally finding market for the produce. The assignment awarded by EATIH, a USAID sponsored NGO.

Alliance for Green Revolution in Africa, Kenya: Sept 2015-Mar 2017: AGRA, an NGO funded by several international agencies, is Kenya head quartered. They awarded a Business Development Consultancy funded by African Development bank was to support growth of 54 seed companies in 11 African countries which have been beneficiary of grant assistance from AGRA. These companies are promoted and managed by local entrepreneurs mainly in the business of agricultural seed production and marketing. Being startups or in early growth stages, under this assignment, companies were supported in developing their market plans, financial planning and in use of management tools and information systems. It was also a good opportunity to understand the agro-commodity marketing systems and the need to develop the ecosystem in most of the countries. Submitted to AGRA a comprehensive strategy for business development of the private seed sector in Africa.