Noida based agri-tech startup Unnati announced on Monday that it has raised $1.7 million in pre series A funding from NABVENTURES, NABARD’s agriculture focused venture fund. The three year old startup intends to utilize this capital to scale up its tech platform and establish more partner centers.

“On this journey of creating farmpreneurs through digital tools we are proud to have NABVENTURES (NABARD) as a partner. NABVENTURES shares our vision of bringing a positive change in the agriculture industry and creating value for all stakeholders. We look

forward to gaining from NABARD’s deep experience, knowledge and scale of operations in Indian agriculture and look forward to a long and mutually beneficial association,” said Amit Sinha, co-founder, Unnati in a statement.

Founded by Ashok Prasad and Amit Sinha, Unnati is working towards getting farmers onto a single digital platform which nurtures farm entrepreneurship. The founders identified the challenges faced by farmers due to lack of predictability in farming and lack of consistent access to production inputs and knowledge. The duo has thus designed a fintech based agri platform that minimizes risks and promotes transparency in farming.

G. R. Chintala, Chairman NABARD and NABVENTURES, said, “Unnati has created a platform to digitalize the major components in the food and agribusiness value chain. The predictive capabilities of the data captured by the platform enhances efficiencies while its transparent processes help in building trust among farmers and FPOs. Unnati has the potential to be a nationwide platform for multiple services in the agricultural value chain.”

Since its inception Unnati has engaged with over 250 thousand farmers spread across six Indian states. The company offers over 100 products and has created more than 1800 partner centers.