Relevance: GS-3: Technology missions in Agriculture. Science and Technology- developments and their applications and effects in everyday life.

Key phrases: Smart farming, Internet of Things devices, artificial intelligence, Kisan-drones, block chain, Connectivity, agri-tech firms.

Why in News?

• Agriculture policy in the era of digitalisation seems to have gained salience in the Union Budget. The budget for agriculture has muddled smart farming with agri-tech start-ups and farmer producer organisations (FPOs). It is a welcome move amidst the pandemic-induced downturn and repealed Farm Acts.

What is Smart Farming?

• Smart farming systems reduce waste, develop productivity and enable management of a greater number of resources through remote sensing. Smart farming also called or precision farming.
• It includes a range of technologies, including remote sensing, Internet of Things (IoT) devices, robotics, big data analytics, and artificial intelligence, to form an integrated crop production management system on a site-specific basis to increase profits, reduce waste, and keep the environmental quality.
• Smart farming is important due to the growing of the expanding global population, the increasing demand for advanced crop yield, the need to use natural resources efficiently, the growing use and sophistication of information and communication knowledge and the increasing need for climate-smart agriculture.

Why effective policymaking for Smart farming is necessary?

• First, smart farming deserves mention as it increases farm productivity and enhances the efficiency of farming system. ‘Kisan-drones’ will be utilised for spraying insecticides, soluble fertilisers and nutrients, as well for monitoring the crops and livestock at various stages. Drone farming will replace manual labour in field operations that can result in unemployment of migrants.
• Second, blockchain can help digitise land records with the help of sensor-based devices in a geo-referenced farm or landscape level. Digitised land records will help the government rationalise subsidies and schemes’ benefits, and insurance claim settlement to farmers.
• Third, notwithstanding the potential of smart farming, how smallholders will use drone or unmanned aerial vehicles in fragmented landholdings and improve their incomes need empirical exploration. For example, using aerial robotics and mapping technology, vDrone, a start-up founded in 2017, charges ₹400-800 for an acre of land and caters to 500-odd farmers in Karnataka. The government, based on Drone Policy 2021, can regulate licensing, pricing and allow the start-ups concerned to render drone technology to farmers’ field.
• Fourth, the application of drone technology may be relevant for large farmers who own more than 10 hectares of land or engage in a cluster farming. Their intention to adopt drones is reasonable for a positive benefit-cost ratio. In India, only 45 per cent of farms use agricultural machinery and farm implements. Drone application, therefore, might remain a distant reality in the presence of limited farm mechanisation and low per capita landholding.
• Fifth, platform businesses in agriculture may rise over time as the market potential of the agri-tech business was $24 billion in 2019–20, as per an EY report. Going by the investor funding disclosures between 2013 and 2017, 59 per cent of start-ups (less than $1 million funding) are in the seed stage, and only 9 per cent ($5-20 million) are in the growth stage. Hence, 40-50 agri-tech entities can cater their products and services to about 1-2 per cent of the farm population.
• Sixth, finance is the most crucial element of a successful business venture. In the Budget, the allocation of a ₹60-crore fund with a blended capital co-investment model would finance start-ups for agriculture and rural enterprises, focussing on the farm-produce value chain. NABARD will facilitate the blended capital model through refinancing the eligible start-ups.

Challenges to Smart Farming in India:

• Connectivity and Bandwidth Issue: A lack of good connectivity or poor network performance and bandwidth speeds will pose a barrier to the adoption of digital technology and decelerate the rise of smart farming and sustainable agriculture. Since many precision agriculture tools like soil sensors, satellite mapping systems and monitoring tools rely on cloud services for data storage, access and transmission, cloud-based computing also needs to be significantly improved in remote areas
• Managing Data Volumes: While data plays an inevitable role in smart agriculture, data management is an ongoing challenge for many farmers and agribusinesses alike. Even a small farm gathers and stores tons of data to inform related operations and marketing decisions. It is nearly impossible to monitor or analyse those hundreds of thousands of data points on a daily/weekly basis, over the entire growing seasons.
• The adoption of precision farming in India is yet in the nascent stage due to its unique pattern of land holdings, poor infrastructure, and lack of farmer’s inclination to take the risk, social and economic conditions and demographic conditions.
• Small size of landholdings: The small size of landholdings in most of the Indian agriculture limits economic gains from currently available precision farming technology. In India, The small and marginal holdings (<2 ha) now constitute 86%, while the large holdings (>10 ha) are merely 0.57% of the total land holdings.
• Lack of Budgetary Support: There is only a marginal increase in budgetary allocation of ₹1,24,000 crore for 2022–23 from ₹1,23,017.57 crore in 2021–22 . Also, the component-wise budgetary allocation is unclear.

Way Forward:

• Key Phrases:  need to be aware of using technology solutions rendered by 450-500 start-ups, namely big data analytics, value chain or market linkages, Farming-as-a-Service, IoT-based communication for monitoring and tracking, and engineering-led innovations for cost-effective farming. An institutional agency is necessary in linking platform-based agribusiness firms with farmer organisations.
• The stated policy dimensions are critical to nurturing a smart farming ecosystem, designing platform content or forms, and promoting a systematic intervention and context-specific scaling in the farm sector.
• The Budget must be explicit on component-wise budgetary allocations, especially for smart farming and platform-integrated agribusiness.
• The utilisation of grants or technical assistance funds can enable farmer organisations learn the nuances of agri-tech firms and what services they need to strengthen planting, distribution, and marketing.
• Given the market potential and market share of agri-tech entities, the government needs to frame the modalities of digital agriculture, integrating input and output agricultural markets, and state governments and lead firms, and complementors can be invited to participate in chalking out a state-wide policy for the conduct of platform businesses.

Source: The Hindu BL

Mains Question:

Q. “Smart farming and IoT-driven agriculture are paving the way for what can be called a Third Green Revolution”. Comment. (250words)