‘I Turned My Life Around’: How a Farmer Built An Aloe Vera Business With a Turnover of Rs 3.5 Cr |
The interviews and reporting for this story were conducted in August 2024.
In the drought-prone Satara district of Maharashtra, farmers were largely dependent on rain for irrigation. Often without any regular irrigation facilities, they would be forced to leave their crops at the mercy of nature.
Nearly two decades back, farmers in Padali village were fooled into taking up aloe vera farming by claiming the crop would ensure good yield in the rainfed region.
“A businessman had come to our village and advertised about aloe vera farming. He distributed pamphlets wherein farmers had stacks of money on one hand and aloe vera plants on the other. It mentioned ‘Aloe vera lagaiye aur lakho kamaiye’ (grow aloe vera and earn in lakhs),” recalls farmer Hrushikesh Jayasing Dhane (44).
Influenced by this, several farmers bought thousands of plants and planted them on their barren lands imagining themselves as the man in the advertisement. “I was curious about the crop, but I also had doubts about it. So I went to the office and enquired about the market. I asked to be told about 10 such farmers who earned lakhs from aloe vera. The local officials got angry and threw me out of the office,” he adds.
Once the harvesting period came in, Hrushikesh says, the businessman had run away. “It was all a fraud. I saw farmers crying. They did not have any strategy to market the crop, so........