According to the World Bank Indicators, 60.43 percent of the land in India was categorised as agricultural land in 2018. In fact, at 157.35 million hectares, India stands next to only the United States when it comes to land area dedicated to agriculture, as per the Indian Brand Equity Foundation.

While historically, agricultural land has been owned and maintained by large and small scale farmers, over the last few decades there has been an increased interest in buying land for farming from urban communities as well. From an investment perspective, investing in farmlands also ensures inherent tax benefits. As per the provisions of Section 10 (1) of the Income Tax Act, agricultural income is not taxable. However, the challenge of maintaining farmlands and lack of expertise has been a key deterrent for many urban dwellers when it comes to farming.

Making investing in agriculture practical and possible

Agritech and management solution providers are exploring use cases to bridge the gap by leveraging technology. For instance, Bengaluru-based Vibez Agro Tech Solutions Private Limited — a sister concern of the established agro realty firm Vibez Estates — specialises in long-term management of various agricultural set-ups – from farmlands, horticulture to fruit-yielding crops, etc on arable lands.

Vibez Agro Tech Solutions manages all agricultural holdings of Vibez gated farming communities across Karnataka. Farm owners in these communities are offered two options – annual tax-free returns on pomegranate plantation or long-term returns on teak plantation. This ensures that the land owners do not have to worry about investing in fixed assets like quarters for labourers, godowns, borewells and security or worry about day-to-day management of the farms. Today, the firm manages 180+ acres of farmlands across the Vibez Estates’ many agro realty gated farm community projects such as Vibez Pomegranate plantation farms at Chikballapur, Sirivana – teak Plantation farms at Chikkaballapur and Channapatna, Anantara – a farmhouse project in the midst of a coffee estates at Sakleshpur, among others.

Nurturing growth in new directions

While Vibez Agro Tech Solutions was founded and led by a former banking professional, Ashwin Kumar, the firm recently onboarded Shashi Mohan, a serial entrepreneur as its Director. Shashi is the Founding Partner of Jeevan Hospital, a multi-specialty hospital in Chikkaballapur. He is also the CEO and Founder of Satva Health Solutions, a pharmaceutical waste management company. At Satva, Shashi was instrumental in establishing R&D centres that specialise in the systemic collection of pharmaceutical waste. The centres segregated micronutrients from the waste and recycled it into a consortium of bio-nutritional fertilisers for agricultural purposes. The opportunity to join Vibez Agro Tech Solutions came at a time when Shashi was looking to support sustainable entrepreneurial ventures.