Adoption Of Precision Agriculture In Indian Scenario: It's Scope, Present Status And Way Forward

1. Presenting by
A.Sai Sundeep Reddy
Admin no: 18191246
M.Sc(Agri.) Agronomy
Adoption of Precision Agriculture in
Indian scenario: It’s Scope, Present
status and way Forward

2.  Precision Agriculture refers to the precise application of agriculture inputs with
respect to soil,weather and crop need in order to improve productivity, quality and
profitability in agriculture
 It is a modern agriculture practice involving the use of technology in agriculture
like remote sensing, GPS and Geographical Information System(GIS)
 It enables farmers to use crop inputs more efficiently including
pesticides,fertilizers, tillage, irrigation water and lot more
 More effective utilization of inputs will bring in more crop yield and quality
without polluting the environment and will result in sustainable agriculture and
sustainable development
 Hence precision agriculture is about doing the right thing,in the right place,in the
right way,at the right time
Precision Agriculture

3. Precision Agriculture cycle

4. Components/Tools in Precision Agriculture
 Precision Farming is combination of application of different technologies. All
these combinations are mutually inter related and responsible for developments
 Global Positioning System (GPS)
 Geographic Information System (GIS)
 Grid Sampling
 Variable Rate Technology (VRT)
 Yield Maps
 Remote Sensors (Satellites & Drones)

5. • Geographic Positioning System (GPS): It is a set of 24 satellites in the Earth orbit. It
sends out radio signals that can be processed by a ground receiver to determine the
geographic position on earth. GPS allows precise mapping of the farms and together with
appropriate software informs the farmer about the status of his crop and which part of the
farm requires what input such as water or fertilizer and/or pesticides etc.

6. • Geographic Information System ( GIS): It is a software that imports, exports and
processes spatially and temporally geographically distributed data

7. • Grid Sampling: It is a method of breaking a field into grids of about 0.5-5 hectares. Sampling
soil within the grids is useful to determine the appropriate rate of application of fertilizers.
Several samples are taken from the grids, mixed and sent to the laboratory for analysis
Field divide into Grids
Soil results

8. • Variable Rate Technology (VRT): The existing field machinery with added
Electronic Control Unit( ECU) and GPS can fulfill the variable rate requirement
of input. Spray booms, the spinning disc applicator with ECU and GPS have been
used effectively for patch spraying
Fertilizers application

9. • Remote Sensing ( Satellites & Drones): These are generally categories of aerial and
satellite sensors. They can indicate variations in the colors of the field that corresponds to
changes in soil type and crop development. Arial and satellite imagery can be processed to
provide vegetative indices, which reflects the health of the plant
Detecting weeds Detecting diseases

11. Advantages Disadvantages
1) It will enhance agricultural
productivity and prevent soil
degradation in cultivable land
resulting in sustained agricultural
development
2)It will reduce excessive chemical
usage in crop production
3)Water resources will be utilized
efficiently under the precision
farming
4)GPS allows agricultural fields to
be survived with ease. Moreover,
the yield and soil characteristics
can also be mapped
5)Non-uniform fields can be sub-
divided into small plots based on
their unique requirements
1)High capital costs may discourage
farmers to not adopt this method of
farming
2)Precision agriculture techniques are
still under development and requires
expert advice before actual
implementation
3)It may take several years to collect
the sufficient data to fully implement
the system
4)It is an extremely difficult task
particularly the collection and
analysis the data

12. Precision Farming in Indian Agriculture

13.  Presently, India is producing more than 200 Mt of food grain which makes India
self-sufficient in food production
 But only quantity cannot meet the need of globalized agricultural market.
Excellent quality as well as high productivity will be the key factor to compete
with others, and the huge scope of PA in India
 In production, India holds world-ranks within 10 in most of the crops (wheat-
2nd, rice-2nd, pulses-1st, cotton-4th, etc.)
 However, in the productivity of these crops, the world ranking varies from 32
(wheat) to 118 (Cotton).Poor scale of mechanization with very small average
holding size
 On other side, Studies have already shown that systematic soil testing followed
by proper application of NPK fertilizers can increase the productivity level by
2–3 times in most of the states of India
Scope of adoption of Precision agriculture
in India

14. Present status of Precision
agriculture in India
 The first thing that comes to mind is that, this system is not for developing countries,
especially India, where the farmers are poor, farming is mostly subsistent and the land
holding size is small
 Application of Precision agriculture technologies is presently at the nascent stage in
India
 Without integration of Farmers Especially, Small and Marginal Farmers the precision
models will remain Incomplete
 Tata Kisan Kendra : The concept of precision farming being implemented by the
TKKs . TCL’s extension services, brought to farmers through the TKKs, use remote-
sensing technology to analyze soil, inform about crop health, pest attacks and coverage
of various crops predicting the final output. This helps farmers adapt quickly to
changing conditions. The result: healthier crops, higher yields and enhanced incomes
for farmers

15.  Tamil Nadu State Government has sanctioned a scheme named “Tamil Nadu Precision
Farming Project” to be implemented in Dharmapuri and Krishnagiri districts covering an area
of 400 ha
 This pilot project is undertaken by the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University and worked with
400 farmers that showed an increase in yield of three to twelve times higher than normal
using precision agriculture techniques
 High value crops such as hybrid tomatoes, capsicum, baby corn, white onion, cabbage, and
cauliflower are proposed to be cultivated under this scheme
 Microsoft and ICRISAT collaborate each other and Introduce Artificial Intelligence(AI) into
agriculture to boost crop yield in Devanakonda, Andhrapradesh. These technology helps in
increase yield up to 30-40%
 Project Directorate of Cropping Systems Research, Modipuram, had started working to help
the Indian farmers to harvest the fruits through frontier technologies

16. Tomato chilli capsicum brinjal
0
20000
40000
60000
80000
100000
120000
Cost Dif ferences
cost in convent ional
cost in precision

17. Tomato chilli Capsicum Brinjal
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
Yield in convent ional in MT
Yield in Precision in MT

18. The policy approach to promote
precision farming at farm level
 Identify the niche areas for the promotion of crop specific precision
farming
 Creation of multidisciplinary teams involving agricultural scientists in
various fields, engineers, manufacturers and economists to study the
overall scope of precision agriculture
 Provide complete technical backup support to the farmers to develop
pilots or models, which can be replicated on a large scale
 Pilot study should be conducted on farmers’ fields to show the results of
precision agriculture implementation
 Creating awareness among farmers about consequences of applying
imbalanced doses of farm inputs like irrigation, fertilizers, insecticides and
pesticides

19. General Adoption Strategies
Keeping in mind about the status of Farmers in India. The Scientists and research institutes
proposed some common adoption strategies for the application of Precision agriculture in India

20. Indian Agritech Startups
 FASAL situated in Banglore, Karnataka
 CROPIN TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS PVT LTD situated in Banglore,
Karnataka
 INTELLO LABS situated in Gurugram, Haryana

21. Challenges in Adopting Precision
Farming in India
 The Adoption of precision farming in India is yet in nascent stage due its
unique pattern of land holdings, poor infrastructure, lack of farmers
inclination to take risk and socio-economic conditions
 Research suggest educational and economic challenges as the two most
important in the application of precision agriculture
 Educational challenges includes lack of local experts, Knowledgeable
research and extension services
 Compared to all challenges Initial investment in Precision agriculture have
more impact

22. Way forward
 Instead of blindly adopting the advanced Precision agriculture
technologies adopted by developed countries, India should adopt
technologies based on the need of socio-economic condition of country
 The most important component in taking PA forward will be in creating a
huge resources for Engineers, Scientists and agriculturists to develop
various components of the technology
 Government Institutes like ICAR, Industries and farmers have to work
together, interact and collaborate to develop smart systems in PA
 Industries have to take charge because they will help in develop the
machinery

23. Conclusion
 When compared to US, and Europe the development and adoption of
precision agriculture in India is a slow process
 In the present time of increasing input costs, decreasing commodity
prices and environmental concerns, farmers and Government authorities
are looking for new ways to increase efficiency, cut costs and shift to
sustainable agriculture.
 To achieve or overcome this problems Precision farming looks promising
as a future tool

24. References
1) P. Mondal, V.K. Tewari Present status of precision farming: a review
Int J Agric Res, 2 (1) (2007), pp. 1-10
2) Shibusawa S. Precision farming approaches to small farm agriculture. Agro-
Chemicals Report. 2002; 2 (4):13-20.
3) M.Wang Possible adoption of precision agriculture for developing
countries at the threshold of the new millennium Computer Electron
Agric, 20 (2001), pp. 45-50

26. THANK YOU
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