WhatsApp virtual assistant to help cotton farmers to sell produce, track payment status

The Agriculture department and the Agriculture Marketing department have launched a WhatsApp bot, a virtual assistant, to help farmers to sell their produce smoothly.

Khammam: Cotton farmers in erstwhile Khammam district can now track the process of procurement and their payments virtually through their mobile phones.

The Agriculture department and the Agriculture Marketing department have launched a WhatsApp bot, a virtual assistant, to help farmers to sell their produce smoothly. The farmers need to send a ‘Hi’ message from their number to the virtual assistant and a list appears with options like eligibility check, sales information, takpatti (voucher) details and waiting time at procurement centres.

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Speaking to Telangana Today, district marketing manager MA Aleem informed that while conducting a survey of cotton production, the Agriculture department collected farmers’ mobile numbers as well as extent of crop and yield expected. The details are integrated into the virtual assistant.

After sending the message to WhatsApp number 8897281111 the farmers can check their details such as the quantity of cotton they could sell at their nearest procurement centre set up by Cotton Corporation of India (CCI). Farmers could also check the process of loading, unloading, and cotton rates in Telugu and English.

As many as 10 procurement centres have been set up ginning mills across the district, he said. As procurement takes place at ginning mills alone the farmers need not take produce to market yards and thus they could avoid problems being faced in taking the produce to markets and then to ginning mills, Aleem explained.

Cotton crop was grown on 1, 99,700 acres of land and 1, 79,730 metric tonnes of yield was expected in Khammam district. There are 1, 10,025 cotton farmers in Kothagudem district.