Alumni of IPB Created the Largest Online Agricultural Marketplace In Indonesia

Who did not know agromaret.com? The company had been transformed into the largest online marketplace and agricultural community in Indonesia. The Founder of business startup that had been running for eight years was the alumni of Bogor Agricultural University (IPB). Yes, Fandi the alumnus of Department of Computer Science of IPB successfully created the business startup that focused in the agriculture.

Agromaret was a community and online trading site with tens of thousands of the agricultural goods. This site served the sale, the demand and the cooperation of almost all agricultural goods (the farm products, the gardens, the forestry, the livestock, the crops, the land, the transportation services, etc). Until August 2017, the agropreneur joined in this site had reached the number of 119,288 people.

This online marketplace was born from the problems of the farmers who were difficult to market their agricultural products. Even that happened often, the market place was played by the middlemen. Eventually the farmers were harmed, because the crops were priced too low. Agromaret.com emerged as an attempt to solve the problem.

“The farmers have difficulty in accessing to sell their commodities, so there are many emerging middlemen who actually incriminate the farmers. The market has also been dominated by the middlemen. In the era of the sophistication of the times, the website is one of the innovations that we can use to help the farmers market their own products online,” said Fandi, the alumni of Computer Science of IPB who curretly served as the CEO of Agromaret.com.

In addition to the business interest of Start-up was also a social mission to empower the community. The farming communities were taught how to sell and transact online. This was fully supported by IPB, especially in the innovation diffusion process. It was proven, Institute for Research and Community Services (LPPM-IPB), had incorporated the good intention of Agromaret into its flagship program. Every Friday, LPPM of IPB conducted the joint training of the Agromaret in the guided village of around campus of IPB.

Nowadays, the students were also invited to take part in developing Indonesian agriculture through the agromaret. This site opened the vacancies for young agripreneurs to join. Fandi who was known to be friendly, saw the students have the great potential in the agricultural market. He hoped in the realm of any agricultural student should work according to his field, that was the agriculture.

Hopefully, this start-up could be widely known, especially for the farmers. Not just providing the stall sale, Agromaret could be the place for the agropreneur discusssion in the agriculture. It was time for the farmers not to be snared by the middlemen and independently could market their own products.

“With a touch of technology, hopefully Agromaret can provide the new opportunities and the hopes for farmers. In this changing era, Indonesian agriculture needs to be built in line with the demands of the times.” said Fandi when expressed the hope of agromaret.com forward.

The agricultural innovation was indispensable, especially to meet the digital era as it was today. It was time for people to realize that the agriculture was vast, not just hoeing and planting seeds. Finally to achieve the true agricultural development, the support of all parties became the mandatory to disseminate the agricultural innovations such as the agromaret.com.(NA/Zul)