Of shrimp and sustainability

• When 500-backed aquatech company JALA launched their app in 2019 and hardware in 2020, the team immediately saw exponential user growth in the shrimp farming community in Indonesia.
• However, Co-founder & CEO Liris Maduningtyas shared that getting revenue was a struggle as they were giving away the technology to shrimp farmers for free. 
• So how did the team overcome this challenge? “Fortunately, through the app, we were able to collect data about when they were harvesting, and how much they were harvesting, and that allowed us to expand our businesses with processors, as well as form and grow our financing businesses,” Liris explained.
• “In 2021, we were finally able to offer end-to-end solutions in which we provide not only technology to assist farmers, but also access to market and financing,” she said.
• Today, the team serves 20,000 shrimp farmers across Indonesia. Their recent funding round of US$13.1M will help them expand outside of Java to Sulawesi and Sumatra.
• Beyond just focusing on improving the productivity of shrimp farms, Liris believes that JALA can help in environmental sustainability. She shared, “There are so many ponds that are sitting idle here; if we just focus on using technology to improve the existing shrimp farms in Indonesia, we can do so much to tackle the issue of food security and supply the entire world with shrimp.”
• “We can replant mangroves there while intensifying farming on the ponds – preserving the environment, but also producing more food,” she added.
• Get the full story here.