English News: Agriculture and Farmers Welfare Minister Shri Narendra Singh Tomar has said that the dream of a self-reliant and digital India will be realized only with the agriculture sector. Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi has shown the way to the country in this regard, following which the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare has taken concrete steps for the digitization of the agriculture sector. With the determination of the Prime Minister, a spirit was born in agriculture and to increase the income of the farmers, many schemes including the historic Prime Minister Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-Kisan) worth Rs 75 thousand crores annually are being implemented with transparency.
Union Minister Shri Tomar said this during the signing ceremony of MoUs of four institutions with the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare. These institutes are (i) Patanjali Organic Research Institute (ii) Amazon Web Services (AWS) (iii) ESRI India Pvt Ltd and (iv) Agribazaar India Pvt Ltd. MoU has been signed with these organizations for a pilot project using farmer database as the base within a period of one year: With ESRI for setting up and launching of “National Agriculture Geo Hub”, digital services and digital services in agriculture value chain. With Agribazar and 3 districts for collaborating with the Department of Agriculture for pilot projects in 3 states (Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan) to promote digital agriculture, along with Amazon Web Services for creation of agriculture related innovation ecosystem. (Haridwar-Uttarakhand, Hamirpur-Uttar Pradesh and Morena-Madhya Pradesh) have signed MoU with Patanjali for agriculture management and farmer service.
The Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare had constituted a task force and a working group of experts and technology experts in this field to prepare the roadmap for digital agriculture. Under the chairmanship of Shri Sanjay Agarwal, Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare and Shri J.J., former Secretary, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Government of India. The Task Force co-chaired by Satyanarayana has prepared a Consultative Paper on India Ecosystem Architecture (IndEA) Digital Ecosystem of Agriculture (IDEA) with a vision to place farmers at the center of agricultural ecology while promoting open digital technologies. Agriculture Minister Shri Tomar also unveiled this document for the comments of agriculture experts, farmers, IT experts and public at this function. Its final document will act as a guide for the digital agriculture sector in the years to come.
Recognizing the importance of digitization in agriculture, the department is creating a federal farmer database and creating various services based on it to create a digital ecosystem of agriculture. This database will be linked to the land records of farmers across the country and unique farmer ID will be generated. Under a unified database for farmers, information about all the benefits and cooperation of various schemes of the central and state government can be kept in this database and it can be a source of information for providing benefits to the farmers in future. So far, the database of details of about 5 crore farmers has been prepared, it is expected that soon the database will be completed by adding all the landholding farmers. The available data related to PM Kisan, Soil Health Card and PM Fasal Bima Yojana has been integrated. The process of collating data from other databases of the Ministry of Agriculture as well as the Ministries of Fertilizers, Food and Public Distribution is underway.
The database including IDEA and solutions based on case based use developed through these pilot projects will provide various support, some of which are as follows: Farmers will be able to make informed decisions about which crop to grow, which variety What seeds to use, when to sow and what best practices to adopt to maximize yield. Those involved in the agricultural supply chain can plan their procurement and logistics with accurate and timely information. At the right time, accurate and smart agriculture can be possible by getting proper information. Farmers can decide whether to sell or store their produce, and when, where and at what price to sell next. In the process, farmers benefit from innovative solutions and individual-specific services powered by emerging technologies while protecting their privacy.
Shri Tomar said that the government is fast on an ideal path to improve the lives of farmers by increasing their income. The government has identified technology as a priority sector and has made a provision to use new digital technologies in the agriculture sector. Agriculture and rural economy are the basic foundation of India and they have the power to face the toughest of situations and emerge victorious. These areas have proved their relevance even in Kovid. Farmers produced more than before, which is expected to improve even further. Summer sowing has also increased by 21 percent.
In the program, the Minister of State for Agriculture, Shri Parshottam Rupala expressed the expectation that technology should reach the fields at the earliest and farmers should get full benefits from them. He appreciated the new initiative. Agriculture Secretary Mr. Sanjay Aggarwal, Patanjali Biological Research Institute Mr. Acharya Balkrishna, ESRI MD Mr. Agendra Kumar, Agribazar Executive Director Mr. Amit Goel, Amazon Web Services India and South Asia Leader Mr. Pankaj Gupta, former Secretary of MEITY Mr. J. . Satyanarayana, Additional Secretary (Digital Agriculture) Shri Vivek Agrawal also expressed his views. State Principal Secretaries, Secretaries (Agriculture) and representatives of Task Force, Working Committee, Steering Committee, Agri Startups and Agriculture Firms were connected virtually.
