Gai Adharit Unnati (GAU)
Creating a Swarnim Bharat where cows are celebrated again.
What is GAU?
GAU (Gai Aadharit Unnati) concept deals in “Ecosystem creation for 360 degrees prosperity based on cows, which can help India achieve its job creation, social, and sustainability goals”.
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We want to create a cow centric development - the cows, the gaushala caretakers, the fodder providers, the Bio-CNG processes, Bio-CNG users, infrastructure creators for these, the farmers who would receive biofertilisers, the donors, local NGOs, business entities, aggregators.
This approach helps us complete the whole circle of the development process because just donation for cows will not really be solving a problem, we need to create a balanced ecosystem where each stakeholder can make a living out of it and thus it will be more sustainable than any other model.
We love and pray our cows but no body really knows the truth behind dairy industry and how they are used and discarded after they become infertile. There is huge population of Indians who truly believe in cows and would love to adopt them or donate for them for their health and safety. But do we have any trustworthy platform to do so?
The idea
What if you could take care of cows online and check on her regularly? Like virtual adoption?
Beginning of the idea is always random, and this is where we started our journey of making a platform. We did go into validating the idea, the business and sustainability of GAU ecosystem. You will see the evolution of the idea as we move along.
Validation
Being an Indian, we don’t even know how to validate the idea of cow’s significance. We just know! But this time we wanted to find out if it true, till what extent is it?
80% of Indian population believes the cow is a sacred animal
One of the major reason being our mythology involves all the animals and their connection of gods we pray. So automatically we put those animals in the similar position as the gods.
Till our previous generation, cows used to be part of almost every house hold
So the cows had agricultural, mythological and spiritual significance. So the love and affection towards cow still exists even if we do not take care of one now. Everyone believes that cow deserved to be treated with respect and should be prayed everyday but if given a chance, would anyone adopt a cow is something we needed to know.
There are donors who are willing to spend 20% to 50% of their income in welfare of cows!
Exploring competition
Most times Indian cow is directly related to religion Hinduism amd donations online are portrayed in the name of hindu gods,named of babas, temples, etc.
Some others are focusing on selling services and products related to cows with donations.
Gaps & opportunities
Online shopping of cow products or cows
While these products are always a demand in market, confusing these two distracts users and reduces trust in the orgnaisation.
Lack of transparency
After the money is donated, how much is going to the cows, which cows and till when? such questions are never answered.
Lack of visible impact
If my donation helped the organisation and by how much, finding these data will be nearly impossible which causes poor user experience.
Connection with religion
Even though majority population in India is Hindu, not every one is religious enough to donate for a cow just because we talk about them in mythology. And users who are not Indians will not connect with sentiments either.
Future follow ups
No body has asked this question, why would donor come back and donate again? Some donors are highly devoted, but there is vast majority who do not see the impact and get de motivated to help animals again.
Talking to stakeholders
We spoke with a few potential users who regularly make donations, non-users , gaushalas, organisations and NGO’s. What would make them help cows?
Regular donor
Cows are dearest to me, every year I donate 10% of total income to the temples who help cows.
Non donor
Yeah I love cows, but not sure which platform to trust. What if my money never reaches to the cow?
Gaushala caretaker
We dont know how to use phones! We know how to take care of cows.
Gaushala owner
We wont get regular donations. Sometimes we take care of cows from our own pockets, because we love our cows.
Non donor
I have no idea how much to donation will really help!
NGO
We need funds to help cows. We need to organise grass, medicines and cow dung to sustain a whole Gaushala
Organisation
We would be happy to utilise cow’s waste products for our use and provide grass in return.
Gaushala owner
People will leave their cows because they cannot feed themselves, they don’t know how to feed the cow. So we take all the cows in.
Learnings & ideas
We spoke with a few potential users who regularly make donations, non-users , gaushalas, organisations and NGO’s. What would make them help cows?
What if user could see which cow/s they have helped and how much?
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Impact made on cow/s donated for.
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Percentage of donation was used by whom.
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No. of days the donation feel the cow
Reduce user’s confusion on “how much to donate”
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Suggesting amount and no. of days it will help one or multiple cow.
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Building trust by also receiving min. amount to help 1 cow for 1 day as well.
If user’s could see exactly which cows re being helped?
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80G certificate to be received by donors assuring where their money is going.
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See the impact on cows donated for.
Making the platform smarter so anybody can help cows.
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AI face recognition so stray cows can be assigned home and lost cows an be found and taken back
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Gamification aspect will increase user’s interest in cow’s details and how to help that cow.
Better sustained ecosystem is not simply dependant on donations.
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In exchange of Cow dug organisations are willing to offer grass, so even when donations are less we will help gaushalas feed cows.
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Above features will motivate gaushala to come onboard with us.
GAU ecosystem
Isolating cow from the whole ecosystem of biogas, CNG, Fertilisers, Industries dependant on it, the. the platform will never be self sustainable.
Personas
Stakeholder - 1
Regular donor
Shivam Jha, 41yo M
Profession - Owns fabric business in Gujarat. Has 2 children and they all believe in lord Krishna and cows. Donates 10% of his total income for cows in the temple he regularly visits.
Interest - Travels a lot for business but all major festivals he celebrates with grand functions. Visits temples regularly if he cannot his family visits everyday.
Problems - He wish he could help more cows. he does not know where else he could trust enough to donate money to help cows.
Stakeholder - 2
Non-Regular interested donor
Rani Singh, 27yo F
Profession - Works in an IT company, Bengaluru as developer. Comes from a small village in Rajasthan. His family used to have cows, due to financial situation they could not kep it anymore.
Interest - Animal lover and wants welfare of all animals. Special affection towards cows. Volunteers for animal rescue project son weekend and would love to do more.
Problems - She does not know how much of her donation will really help cows. Hesitant due to lack of transparency.
Stakeholder - 3
Gaushala owner
Mahalakshmi Mahato, 55yo F
Profession - Owns gaushala, Surat from 20 years and takes care of cows with help of 3 other workers. Mother tongue is gaujarati. Does know english, speaks basic hindi. respects and prays cows, believes her work is very noble.
Interest - Names all the cows herself and gives tie to each one of them everyday. She also likes to play ludo on mobile with her grandchildren.
Problems - It is very expensive to sustain with 50 cows in Gaushala. Gaushalas receives donations from temples but it is not regular or sometimes enough.
Stakeholder - 4
NGO Manager
Varn Singh Pratap, 33yo M
Profession - NGO manager from Bihar but placed in Rajasthan. The NGO helps a lot of organisation including human trafficking, endangered animals, gaushalas, etc
Interest - Likes his job as he gets to help a lot og people and animals. Likes to visits temples in his free time. He prays cows whenever he sees one.
Problems - He would like to help more people but NGo does not receive enough donations to help everyone.
Stakeholder - 5
Rannvijay, 49yo M
Varn Singh Pratap, 33yo M
Profession - Owns incense stick factory near a village in Rajasthan. Its a g=family business, they have been doing it for 45 years. They buy cowdung for their product from nearby gaushalas.
Interest - He likes to go out for a drive in greenery and visit animal sanctuaries. He loves to fine dine in restaurants. He likes cow products like milk and ghee, gets the purest quality frm gaushalas.
Problems - He wants to increase business by increasing manufacturing but he has shortage of cow-dung. He is ready to buy them with extra price but he does not know how to get a regular amount everyday.
Identifying goals and strategising ideas
After getting loads of ideas, deciding which ones to keep, park and chuck is the next biggest task. Team meetings with decision makers understanding possibilities and identifying primary goals.
Design system
Final screens
Onboarding
Users should get a hint of what we do and who we are.
Landing Page
First few things users will see is our vision and who we are. It is important to build trust before donation begins.
Landing page cards
Donation stats
Customers can wee the impact they have made, no. of cows they have helped and history about their cows.
Face scan
Customers can see the impact they have made, no. of cows they have helped and history about their cows.
Payment suggestions
Helping user understand how much payment will help a cow for how many days.
Success metric
We grabbed spaces in a lot of newspapers and articles about our new AI facial recognition technology. This helped in increase in signups and donations on the platform.
100 +
Donations
The platform received more than 100 donations in 1 week
500+
Cows saved
We have onboarded more than 500 stray cows to our verified gaushals.
50+
Signups
Users becoming first time donorss & members of the GAU platform