Sundays were casual resting days for Narayanan Sridharan, a resident of Thiruvanmiyur, Chennai until a chance article in a weekend newspaper sent him to Thiruvanmiyur beach.

“That was how I met my first organic produce suppliers,” he says, referring to a forum organized by a local non-profit organization on the beach. “They were people with a personal touch, and I had confidence in them.”

Organic produce has grown as a market in Chennai city over the past decade. It follows on the heels of a surge in health consciousness and environmental awareness, with the global demand for organic produce hitting $820 million in 2020. Small organic farmers are finding newer, more dedicated consumer bases as opposed to a mainstream market base that is often exploitative and profit-driven on the side of the middlemen.

Organic farming as a form of agriculture is a return to traditional forms of production, to ensure chemical-free produce for daily consumption. Many choose to launch their own farms out of a desire to provide for their own households, as opposed to farmers who cultivate these products for a living. But in both cases, the sale of this produce in such a way that it is not exploitative and fetches a fair price is a constant worry for the farmers.

Some people refer to organic farms as “a return to the past”, but they could not be more wrong. In the past, farming markets relied on a local economy, which has become obsolete in an era of profits and commercialization. Just a change in the method of production cannot translate into a change in the market. This is where non-profit organisations and farmer markets step in, working with a personalized, local community-driven consumer base for the produce sourced from farmers. In other words, this is the hub and spoke model reimagined.

ReStore, a not-for-profit organisation in Chennai is a supplier of organic produce. They are committed to authenticity and no retail profits. They are directly involved with small farmer groups and work to build a personal and community relationship that allows them to ensure the produce quality and deliver it to the consumers. To support the farmers, their prices are set for a whole year after discussion with the farmers themselves, and this protects them from market fluctuations and provides them with a fair price.

“We are volunteer-driven, and our model is centred around a small community of interested customers,” says Radhika Rammohan, a volunteer at reStore since 2009. The store caters to a consumer base of around a hundred people. They have no plans of expanding into a brand, but the ideals and principles of reStore were taken forward by Ananthoo, the founder volunteer of Organic Farmers Market. It is reStore’s sister organisation, and it works with the same standards of pricing and quality control at multiple outlets across the city.

This model serves to build up the interest people have in the source of their produce and makes it a more transparent process. The concept of a fixed price means that there is no exploitation, either of the producer or the consumer. In the case of small farmers who do not go for hired labour and work on their farms themselves, the pricing is a genuine challenge. “It’s hard to find consumers for our organic produce,” says Divya Pradeep, 37. She supplies her produce to only family and friends, because of the size of her farm. “Either people don’t buy it because organic produce is costly, or they don’t buy our produce because it is cheaper and they believe organic produce should be costly.”

The typically high price of organic produce in the mainstream market means that most people see it as a status symbol. The consumption then becomes less about the health benefits or the environmental impact and more about the image of a cultured person. But Kalavathi Sridharan, a yoga instructor, believes that you don’t have to be rich to use organic produce – you just need to know the right people. In fact, she even directs her students to her suppliers and recommends organically produced foods to them.

“I lived in a village for twenty years,” Mrs Sridharan, 62, says, “and I ate food grown on my father’s farm. When I came to the city and found the right suppliers who had small farms and were not profit-driven, I knew I could trust their produce and get it at a lower price.” When farmers are not commercialising their farms, and their production is not their sole source of income, she believes they are more likely to stick to their morals and their principles when it comes to quality. This, however, is a minute section of producers in a country where agriculture makes up 19.9 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product.

But it all comes back to the transparency that consumers respect. Organisations that are committed to this transparency and consumer-driven production are more likely to be able to find a committed consumer base. “We share videos of the production processes and of our farms,” says Dhasaratha Raja, CEO of Visaka Groups, an organic produce retail chain that supplies pulses, vegetables, fruits, and herbal produce across Chennai city. “We also conduct talks and share all the details about our farms.” These videos and word of mouth are, he believes, the reason he has been able to expand his consumer base across several cities without facing losses.

The strength of a community is one that cannot be ignored. Through personalised product development, transparency, and a genuine dedication to do good and give back to society, these organic produce suppliers have built up a reputation for trustworthiness that can rival that of a corporation with multiple certifications. CY Sathyan, an organic dhal brand started in 2019 has established itself in the market as serious competition to the mainstream brands like Udhayam in Chennai, with an annual turnover of Rs. 428 crores. It has established itself for its good quality dhal at reasonable prices and has even been marked an Amazon’s Choice product on the popular online shopping platform. The Chairman and Managing Director, C.Y. Sathyan, of VTS Enterprises India, Pvt. Ltd., the company behind the brand, states that their policy of “Quality, Service, Price”, along with their active consumer feedback is the reason they have managed to grow.

But the Indian government is not very friendly to these small farmers. Chemical fertilizers and non-organic production fall under a government subsidy scheme, and most people can make ends meet by availing it. The Government of India under the National Project on Organic Farming does aim to provide subsidies for commercial production units manufacturing bio-fertilizers, but this does not translate to support for the farmers themselves. This state of affairs is not likely to change any time soon, and the high costs of maintaining a farm without support only drive people away from converting to organic production.

The market does not work on the basis of just goodwill and mutual respect. As Mr Sathyan puts it, “There are no sentiments or emotions in business.” Regardless of the ideals of these small organic produce suppliers, they cannot compete with or overthrow an exploitative system that has deeply entrenched itself through industrialisation. The markets have a reach and structure that small organisations cannot combat unless they also shift to commercialisation.

The high price of organic produce deters consumers, but the price will only come down and become less exploitative if it takes up a larger share of the market economy. In 2022, the major organic brand, Sresta Natural Bioproducts, holds the largest share in the Indian market at 28 per cent. This is not a significant amount considering that agriculture itself makes up less than 20 per cent of the economy.

Despite these constraints, the organic food market has potential for growth. Through the efforts of the organisations like reStore, Organic Farmers Market, and Visaka, people are learning to be aware of where their food comes from and what is involved in their production. As Ananthoo of Organic Farmers Market puts it, “We might not be able to challenge the mainstream, but they will fear us because of the strength of our principles.”