The Indian agriculture sector contributes nearly 18 percentage of gross national product( GDP) and 40 percentage of the total rural Net Domestic Product( NDP ). Despite its significant contribution to driving socio-economic growth, Indian agriculture still faces a number of challenges. These wander from issues such as low-pitched productivity to climate change, and shortcoming of access to finance.

Pain pitches in Indian agriculture

Lack of knowledge about latest methods and technology: A majority of Indian farmers are smallholders who rely on traditional resource-intensive farming skills. They have limited access to modern machinery, logistics and storage facilities, and info such as data on weather patterns, soil state, and protection of crops.

Unpredictable climate changes and lack of access to information and prognosis to alleviate these: Adverse climate change is one of the main threats to sustainable agriculture in India, because it begins land degradation and reduction in crop yield and produce. It too leads to increased attacks by pests such as locusts, as was understood more recently in December 2019 where over 25,000 hectares of crops were destroyed in what professionals period as the worst-such attack in 25 times. A report by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research( ICAR) was of the view that difficulties caused by climate change could shorten agricultural produces by up to 9 percentage in the medium term( 2010 -2 039 ). Farmers are especially vulnerable to the adverse effects of natural disasters and climate change, like droughts and inundates, including loss of harvests, sheep, and infrastructure, to reduced production and loss of income. The unpredictability of such disasters becomes it much more difficult for farmers. But engineering is changing all that, as we will discuss later in this article.

Supply chain gaps: The agricultural furnish order in India is unorganised and complex, and suffers from a lack of transparency and coordination between various stakeholders. The ensue is large scale wastage of agricultural produce. Harmonizing to a study by the Central Institute of Post-Harvest Engineering and Technology( CIPHET ), practically 16 percent of fruits and veggies, and up to 10 percent of cereals is squandered every year. Multiple stakeholders such as farmers, aggregators, food processors are not on the same page or willing to share information openly, leading to inconsistent data. The pre and post-harvest journey of the induce needs to be entirely traceable to improve accountability and transparency. An improvement in transparency about processes and communication among all stakeholders in the agricultural supply chain will lead to reduced wastage and increased customer trust.

Lack of access to funding: Harmonizing to the Economic Survey 2020, in order to achieve the Indian government’s target of doubling farmers& apos; income by 2022, there is an urgent need to address basic monetary challenges such as access to credit and proper insurance coverage in the agricultural and allied sectors.

How technology is changing the narrative

With the increasing digitalisation of India, today engineering can address most of the challenges that farmers face — from clay publishes, climate, irrigation, to supply chain gaps. It can help them predict weather blueprints more accurately, adopt more sustainable irrigation practises, increase wastage and, in turn, experience better fruit and higher incomes. Farmers can now use something as simple as their smartphones to receive timely updates, relevant information and monitor their cultivates. More farmers are beginning to understand how leveraging solutions that use the latest technologies such as Artificial Intelligence( AI ), Machine Learning( ML ), and Cloud gives them greater environment resilience, higher cultivate provide, and better price control.

Smart farming that uses modern digital technologies such as sensors, site data derived from GPS and satellites, robotics and analytics is changing the face of agriculture in India.

India’s National Strategy on AI recognises agriculture as a priority sector for implementation of AI-driven mixtures. Harmonizing to the Niti Aayog, AI in agriculture is expected to grow at a rate of 22.5 percentage CAGR, and is likely to be valued at $ 2.6 billion by 2025. AI can help farmers foresee condition patterns. Big Data helps improve the relent, reduces gamble, and multiplications effectivenes. With the title data, farmers will be able to take timely decisions, on what crop to broadcast, when to sow it, and what technique to use.

In recent years, the impact of climate change on the agriculture sector has been more pronounced. The Indian government’s Economic Survey( 2018) estimated that adverse effects of climate change led to an annual loss of$ 9-10 billion. There is no doubt that climate-resilient technologies are the need of the hour, and precision agriculture enables farmers to tackle climate change challenges with ease and efficiency. Precision agriculture squanders IoT-based approachings that meet raising more accurate and deliver more precise upshots. Located on this, farmers can impel informed decisions. It utilises deep data about a specific location and cultivates to optimise processes, becoming them most efficient, both in terms of resource utilisation as well as expense. It also should contribute to more sustainable agricultural practices.

Agriculture is now most transparent, efficient and sustainable

Today, with the assistance of digital agricultural answers improved exercising computer imagination and deep-learning algorithms, farmers can monitor crop and soil health, only knew the genetic engineering of seeds, learn best practices for farming, and are also involved in better livestock monitoring. They can use predictive analytics-based tools to understand environmental impacts on crop relents and mean the best course of action. We too have easy-to-use digital pulpits, which cure farmers adapt faster to climate-smart agricultural practices, especially in flood and drought-prone regions.

One such solution is CropIn’s digital programme which monitors and captivates farm-level data and delivers real-time advisories on season-wise crop configurations, weather-based advisories, information about sowing, clay state, seed therapy, fertiliser application, care of pasture disease and treatment of livestock.

TraceX Technologies is another startup that is helping farmers endorse sustainable agricultural practices. Its digital agriculture pulpit shapes the agricultural supply chain most efficient, traceable and transparent. This has led to better quality, meat safe, and client commitments.

Decision intelligence stages, like the one built by SatSure, use satellite images, machine learning, for accurate crop monitoring. In the aftermath of natural disasters, this helps decision-makers and powers get accurate information to disburse relief to distressed farmers on time.

There are sensors and monotones that are helping farmers defended pests, scatter pesticides, and monitor crop health, among others.

We too have direct farmer-to-consumer stages being implemented by startups like Kalgudi that directly connect farmers to end consumers to prevent exploitation by middlemen, and be enhanced their livelihoods.

Empowering farmers with the liberty digital implements and insight on end-to-end contemporary agricultural technologies and rules including precision agriculture, sustainable agriculture, farm machinery management, sell and consumer management, has made a significant impact on the agriculture sector.

To learn more about how engineering is helping restructure India’s agricultural sector, and ushering in a new era of progress, read the eBook Serving a Digital-first India by AWS. Click here todownload your copy.

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