For years, Deepak Sabharwal knew food largely from the other side of the table.
He had spent nearly two decades in the corporate world, working with companies such as General Electric (GE), PepsiCo, and Tata. His days were about meetings, numbers, and growth. Farming was something he spent time doing on weekends, at his family’s farms in Pushkar, Rajasthan.
Then one day, he noticed the pesticides being used on his own farm. Around the same time, his mother was diagnosed with cancer. The two things came together in his mind in a way he could not ignore.
“I began wondering what we were really eating every day, and that was a simple but uncomfortable question to ask,” he tells The Better India.
That question eventually took him from boardrooms to fields. His hands-on farming journey began in 2012, while he was still working at GE, and he spent almost four years travelling to Pushkar on weekends to learn farming and experiment on his family’s land.
Today, he is based in Delhi NCR and is the co-founder and CEO of Earthy Tales Organics Private Limited. The company was formally started in December 2018 with a focus on natural farming, farmer livelihoods, and making produce grown without synthetic pesticides and fertilisers more accessible to urban families.
Deepak wanted Earthy Tales to do more than sell vegetables. For the co-founder, it was about fixing a disconnect he had begun to see between the soil, the farmer, and the person eventually eating the food.
Years of working closely with farmers taught him that organic farming involves much more than avoiding synthetic pesticides and fertilisers.
Here are seven lessons he wishes anyone entering the space would understand.
1. Start with the soil
It is tempting to begin a farming business by asking one question. What should I grow?
Deepak believes there is another question that should come first. What is the condition of my soil?
Today, Deepak is based in Delhi NCR and is the co-founder and CEO of Earthy Tales Organics Private Limited.
Before investing heavily, he advises testing the soil and water, understanding what was previously grown on the land, and finding out which chemicals may have been used there. Because for him, organic farming does not begin with a label. It begins underground.
“Organic farming begins with soil, not with certification or branding,” he says.
A healthy farm may require compost, organic matter, mulching, natural inputs, better water management and, where appropriate, livestock integration. The aim is to move away from synthetic pesticides and fertilisers while gradually rebuilding the health of the land.
That is also why he advises beginners not to convert an entire farm at once. He suggests starting with a small patch, trying a crop and observing how it performs over one or two cycles before taking the bigger plunge.
After all, the soil has its own pace. A business plan cannot always make it move faster.
2. Build the whole system
One of his early assumptions was that organic farming was largely about avoiding synthetic pesticides and fertilisers. He soon realised how incomplete that understanding was.
Seed selection, soil health, water, compost, livestock, pest management, crop planning, harvesting, grading, storage, and transport all become part of the equation. “Natural farming is not only about not using chemicals. It is a complete system,” he says.
And the work does not end when the crop leaves the field. It has to be sorted, packed, and transported. Some produce will be damaged. Some will not look perfect. Some may not sell in time.
All of that has a cost.
For someone starting, this is an important reality to understand. You are not simply starting a farm. You are building a system around that farm.
3. Earn farmer trust
Getting a farmer to change the way they have farmed for years is not as easy as giving them a training session.
Deepak learnt this by working closely with farmers.
A farmer cannot treat a crop as an experiment.
A crop failure can mean a family’s income is affected. So when someone asks a farmer to reduce their reliance on synthetic pesticides or change farming practices, the farmer needs more than promises.
“Farmers do not trust speeches. They trust consistency,” he adds.
The aim is not only to stop using chemicals, but to gradually rebuild the health of the land.
That consistency can mean repeated visits to the farm, helping identify pests, discussing what to do when a crop begins to fail, providing training and, most importantly, helping create a market for what the farmer grows.
At Earthy Tales, the approach has involved working closely with farmers and supporting them in moving towards natural farming methods that rely less on synthetic inputs. The lesson is particularly important for entrepreneurs who want to work with farmers. If you want farmers to take a risk with you, you have to be willing to share some of that risk.
4. Find buyers first
This was another lesson that took the co-founder time to learn. In farming, it is easy to fall in love with the idea of growing something. But a good crop does not automatically become a good business.
“Natural farming must be market-linked. Otherwise, the farmer carries all the risk,” he says.
So before sowing, an entrepreneur needs to think about the customer.
What does the customer buy regularly? What can the region grow reliably? What price is realistic? How far does the produce need to travel? Who will buy it?
At Earthy Tales, he noticed that many customers first came looking for fresh fruits and vegetables. Once they developed confidence in the source, they began buying everyday staples such as atta, pulses, oils, spices, and ghee.
The company was formally started in December 2018 with a focus on natural farming, farmer livelihoods, and making chemical-free food more accessible to urban families.
That taught him something important about building a food business. Trust usually comes before the larger basket. A farmer may produce something excellent. But if there is no reliable buyer at the other end, the farmer still carries the risk.
The market, therefore, cannot be an afterthought. It has to be part of the crop plan from the beginning.
5. Plan for uncertainty
This sounds obvious, but it is one of the hardest realities for a business-minded newcomer to accept. Nature does not work according to demand forecasts.
A farmer can plan for a crop, only for rain, heat, pests, or disease to change the outcome. Even when the crop does well, demand may not arrive at the same pace. Deepak remembers believing in the early days that good produce would naturally find its way to customers.
“I believed that if we had good produce, the rest would follow,” he says. “But food does not work like that.”
A crop arrives when it is ready, not when the customer wants it.
It also creates a risk of wastage.
Produce can be rejected because it is bruised, oddly shaped, or simply because there is more of it than the market needs that week. For a new entrepreneur, planning for unpredictable harvests and demand is essential. Crop cycles, storage and transport need to be flexible enough to handle surplus produce or unexpected delays.
The more fragile the system, the more one bad season can hurt.
6. Know your numbers
There is a natural temptation to think that a business built around a good cause will eventually work itself out. The co-founder has learnt otherwise.
Organic farming can involve higher planning requirements, uncertain yields, wastage, packaging costs, logistics and working capital. If these numbers are ignored, even a business with the right intentions can struggle.
“You cannot build a farmer-first business if the business itself is not financially sustainable,” he says. That does not mean reducing farming to profit margins. It means understanding that farmers cannot be supported by a business that keeps losing money.
For him, the lesson is to calculate what each sale really costs, from sourcing and packaging to transport and wastage, before deciding whether the business can grow.
The goal is to find a balance where the customer gets trustworthy food, the farmer gets a fairer return, and the business remains strong enough to keep going.
7. Give it time
Perhaps the biggest investment an aspiring organic farmer needs is not money.
It is patience.
Soil may take time to recover. Farmers may take time to trust a new method. Customers may take time to change their buying habits. And a young business may take years before its systems begin to settle.
Before investing heavily, he advises testing the soil and water, understanding what was previously grown on the land.
The co-founder knows this personally. His own journey began with weekend trips to Pushkar while he was still working full time. For almost four years, he travelled between his corporate job and the farm, slowly learning what it meant to grow food.
A good farm needs more than good crops
“Patience is not optional in this business. It is part of the model,” he says.
That patience is also needed when things go wrong. A farmer may have a poor harvest. A crop may not sell. A transition may take longer than expected. A customer may question the price.
The temptation is to look for a shortcut. But Deepak’s experience has taught him that there are very few shortcuts when you are trying to change something as fundamental as how food is grown.
Deepak’s journey from corporate offices to farming has given him a broader view of an organic farming business. Growing crops without synthetic pesticides and fertilisers is only part of the work. The rest is making sure farmers earn a fair return, produce reaches customers and the business can keep going.
For him, Earthy Tales is an attempt to bring soil health, farmer livelihoods and consumer wellbeing together. And for anyone thinking of starting an organic farming business, the question goes beyond how much they can grow. It is whether they can build a system in which the soil, the farmer and the customer all have a reason to stay.
All pictures courtesy Deepak Sabharwal.
