Grantee Profile
Villgro, formerly Rural Innovations Network, works with smallholder farmers in rural India to develop, field test and commercialize inventions that can help significantly improve the lives of poor and vulnerable people.
Villgro has tapped into the experience and wisdom of rural farmers to successfully create close to 1,500 products for local users.
With support from the Rockefeller Foundation, Villgro follows a "user-driven" model for innovation. The organization recognizes that end-users themselves know their problems best and are best equipped culturally and socially to come up with the solutions. It has helped local inventors produce and sell their inventions to other farmers across rural India.
Since 2001, Villgro has tapped into the experience and wisdom of rural farmers to successfully create close to 1,500 products for local users.
- Villgro helped an inventor develop an energy-efficient burner for kerosene stoves that is cheaper, longer-lasting, safer and easier to maintain than conventional burners—making it appealing to the rural consumer.
- The organization helped create a substitute for farmyard manure that is cleaner and easier to apply.
While open to ideas from any sector, Villgro currently focuses on agriculture: seeds, agri-pesticides, agri-fertilizers, farm machinery and tools, extension services and farmer-to-market linkage services.
