Telangana to use emerging technologies in agriculture

Saagu Baagu (Agriculture-Advancement) project was being taken up as part of the AI4AI initiative, (Artificial Intelligence for Agriculture Innovation)

Hyderabad: The State government came up with the Saagu Baagu (Agriculture-Advancement) project to transform the agriculture sector by deploying emerging technologies in a scalable, inclusive and sustainable way. This project was being taken up as part of the AI4AI initiative, (Artificial Intelligence for Agriculture Innovation) launched by IT Minister KT Rama Rao in August last.

The AI4AI initiative resulted in the identification of nine frameworks and 30 use cases (a methodology used in analysis to identify, clarify and organise system requirements) along with four key parts of the agriculture value chain, including Crop Planning, Smart Farming, Farmgate-to-Fork and Data-driven Agriculture.

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Now, under the Saagu Baagu project, the aim is to influence at least one lakh farmers covering four crop cycles and establish the required infrastructure for scaling it up across the State. The Project is being led by the Agriculture Department in association with PJTSAU, ITE&C Department and World Economic Forum. IT Principal Secretary Jayesh Ranjan said “In order to truly improve the lives of farmers, adoption of technology is the only sustainable approach and the same will be facilitated under Saagu Baagu Project”

To this effect, the State government prepared an Expression of Interest (EoI), which will be released in a couple of weeks. The objective of the EoI is to get suitable Project Implementation Partners (PIP) and their consortia of leading Agri ecosystem players on board to establish innovative technological solutions along the Agri value chain. The project shall be implemented on the principle – ‘Think Big, Start Small, Scale Fast’.

While the overall Saagu Baagu project is planned to be a five-year focused effort, the role of PIPs on board under the EoI, will be confined to two years, covering three to four crop cycles across multiple districts of select priority crops. Accordingly, it will be for cotton, chill and turmeric crops during Kharif season and for groundnut, Bengal gram and paddy during Rabi season.

Each PIP along with its consortium will have to propose at least five distinct use-cases across any crop value chain to ensure a holistic deployment is undertaken and not just a conventional single use-case pilot approach.

Considering the challenges to scale emerging technologies and the multi-dimensional nature of the agriculture sector, a collaborative approach between government and the private sector as a Public-Private Cooperation (PPC) has been finalized for the Saagu Baagu Project. Under the PPC framework, the government would establish the required environment in collaboration with State institutions, which would address challenges and accelerate the adoption and usage of Agritech use cases.

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