Meet Archana Stalin, a young engineer who switched from her lucrative career to pursue her dream of Organic Farming. She started MyHarvest Farms in 2018 along with her husband Stalin and it’s been a fruitful and impactful journey since then.
Archana was born in Theni and brought up in Chennai. Her father worked in a private firm while her mother took care of the home department. She has a younger sister whom she calls her best companion.
At St. Dominics Anglo Indian Girls Higher Secondary School where she schooled, she excelled both in studies and in extra-curricular activities. Blessed with leadership qualities, she was elected the school’s head girl and made her school proud by becoming the school topper in the Board exams
Though Archana aspired to become a doctor, she ended up studying engineering at the College of Engineering, Guindy and graduated in B.E. GeoInformatics. Her better half Stalin was her classmate and best friend in college and they tied the knot after completing their education.
In 2014, her trip across Indian villages where she got to meet many inspiring social entrepreneurs set her thinking about her purpose in life. She developed an interest in farming and made a humble beginning with a terrace garden, made compost and adopted a sustainable lifestyle. It was during this period that she learned about Organic Farming. Both Archana and Stalin met farmers across the state and were convinced that natural farming was the need of the hour.
They quit their plum jobs in 2016 and leased a small piece of land to get a hands-on experience on the practical aspects of farming. They started myHarvest Farms in 2018. The farm is located in Sembedu, a village in Thiruvallur district about 40 kilometres from Chennai. They started out with 1 farm and 18 families and have grown over the years to impact over 340 farmers and more than 10,000 families in Chennai.
Their mission was to grow chemical-free food, make people eat healthy food products and improve the livelihood of farmers. Their team comprises of more than 50 members- mostly youngsters and more than half of them are women. They supply over 280 edible food products that are naturally grown, fresh, local and seasoned to customers.
In her journey of 6 years, Archana came across some challenges that women entrepreneurs face. The first challenge is that the ideas of a woman entrepreneur are not taken seriously. Secondly, many women are not able to focus on their career without feeling guilty for their inability to spend enough time on the home front. Thirdly, travelling at odd hours and meeting strangers is another hardship that women face. Archana however is blessed with a supportive life partner and an equally supportive family (mother and in-laws) who encourage her in all her entrepreneurial endeavors.
She regularly gets to meet up with a group of friends who are also entrepreneurs and they spend time helping out and learning from each other. She feels that peer support makes a world of difference. They provide feedback, criticism, share connections and basically lift each other up.
Many people have asked her how it feels to be a woman doing farming. She says that even though 84 % of women in the rural areas are involved in agriculture or allied work, they are not given credit for it. They are paid lesser wages than men even though they put in the same number of hours of work. She hopes to change this scenario and remove the disparity that women face.
Archana recalls that during the first four years of starting this venture, she and Stalin became such workaholics and they worked without a break. Nowadays they make it a point to take a break every four months and go on a holiday with the family. She also relishes taking little breaks to enjoy some ME Time which is mostly long solo rides on her bike while listening to songs.
She is the recipient of multiple awards including the MEITY NASSCOM Agri Entrepreneur of the year award in 2021, the Aval Vikatan Award, Raindrops Award, Homepreneur award etc.
More than the joy of winning awards, the fact that she is able to uplift rural livelihoods and make a difference in the lives of young farmers gives her a feeling of satisfaction.
She conducts awareness and motivational sessions at colleges and forums and is a recognized speaker at TEDx, INKtalks and Josh Talks.
Over a span of 6 years, myHarvest Farms has made an impact on people from the city. They have an opportunity to reconnect with nature and support farmers to follow Climate Resilient Natural Farming. Many customers have realized the importance of consuming chemical free food and have become her extended family. She curates farm visits for customers to get a first- hand experience of farming. For Archana, this is just the beginning and her goal is to scale up the business without compromising on values and ethics.
You can check out their website https://www.myharvestfarms.com/ to know more.
Juliana Sridhar is a lawyer and columnist
