Dr. Parveen Kumar, Dr. Anil Kumar
Technology founds wide application when it has wider social dimensions. Agriculture sector in India is very crucial one. It plays a vital role in the nation’s economy as about 58 per cent of the rural households depend on agriculture for their livelihood. Therefore any technological intervention in this field means that it will have implications for a large majority of the population in the country. Agriculture in India has come of ages.
Agri Market Mobile App: This app has been developed by the Information Technology division of Ministry of Agriculture and Family welfare. This app provides information to farmer about prices of crops in market within 50 kilo meters of their own device location. The app automatically captures the location of farmers using mobile GPS and fetches market prices of crops in market which fall within range of 50 kilometers. Both these apps are available in English as well as Hindi and can be
downloaded from Google play store or
m-Kissan portal
Crop Insurance Mobile App: The Government of India has also launched the Prime Minister Fasal Bima Yojana which is wider in coverage and covers more crops. It has been seen that farming community as well as the field functionaries of the agriculture department are not aware of the knowhow of the whole insurance process. Crop Insurance App helps the farmers not only to find out complete details about insurance cover available in their area but also to calculate the insurance premium for notified crops, coverage amount and loan amount in case of a loaned farmer
Smart Agri App: This app developed by Vijayragavan Viswanathan, a scientist working in European Organization for Nuclear Research connects with underground censors to deliver easy to understand data such as soil moisture and mineral levels to farmers’ mobile devices.
Aqua App: This app has been developed by Ramachandra Raju and Venu Dentuluri for the farmers along coastal areas in state of Andhra Pradesh. This app is available in Android and iOS app stores, the application provides real time information about fish industry, market prices and latest information about weather. Farmers also get advice on feeds and top manufacturing industry so that they should not sell their catch at throw away prices. About 1000 farmers in the coastal area of the state have down loaded this app on their mobiles.
IFFCO Kissan Agriculture App: It is also a farmer’s exclusive suvidha app. It helps the Indian farmers to take informed decisions by accessing customized agricultural information related to their needs. It provides the latest market prices, weather forecast, agricultural advisories based on weather conditions, best practices tips related to agriculture, animal husbandry, horticulture; a buyer and seller platform, and all agriculture related news and govt. schemes. It provides agriculture alerts and agriculture advisories in 11 Indian languages in text as well as agriculture audio clip for the convenience of the farmers who are most comfortable in their own language.
Farmers can also access the exclusive IFFCO Kissan Sanchar Limited (IFFCO) ‘534351’ agriculture helpline service through the “IFFCO Green SIM card” to get access to IKSL experts and also get One Touch connectivity to Kissan Call Centre Services “18001801551” number from the IFFCO Kissan app.
Digital Mandi India: This App helps in checking the latest Indian agricultural commodities Mandi prices from different states and districts. It is easy to use and enables farmers, traders and all others to know the updated Mandi price from anywhere. Farmers can get information about prices in different states.
ID Weeds: This app helps us to identify weeds. It helps the farmers to search weeds with an easy-to-use identification system. Weeds can be identified based on a number of features, including their habitat, leaf type, flower color, root system and other characteristics.
FarmLogs: This app introduces one to the premium farm management and prescription farming capabilities of the company’s software and advisory services. With this mobile app one can quickly map the field boundaries and get real-time information on each field, including rainfall data, soil maps, yield maps and growth stage estimates.
AgMobile: This app also offers an array of information including commodity markets, news and weather. Among its many features are local cash grain quotes and charts, breaking news from successful farming, live market commentary and technical analysis.
SoilWeb App: The app uses the GPS of the phone to tell about soil type while standing on and explore deep levels of information from United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) soil survey data. The app gives just about everything you need to know about one’s farm’s soil, including soil type and taxonomy, land classification, hydraulic and flood ratings, organic matter, and more.
These apps are being used in the country and some of them are used by peoples in different countries all over the globe. All over the world the number of apps available for download continues to grow. Android users can now select from some 2.2 million apps, while Apple’s App Store holds 2 million apps, according to the statistics portal Statista.com. These apps are affordable, have relative advantage, are simple and thus have all the attributes to become a powerful tool for technology dissemination and other relevant information to the farming community. As Prime Minister Narendra Modi puts it, the second green revolution will come in the country based on science, technology in the agricultural sector and mobile apps are now doubt a noble innovation.
(The authors are from Advanced Center for Rainfed Agriculture (ACRA), SKUAST-J)