News Brief
Union Agriculture Ministry To Bring Data Policy For Farm Sector And Build National Farmers Database
A farmer in his field.
Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar has declared that the central government is considering chalking out a national database for farmers and initiating a data policy for the farm sector.
Currently, this database is being prepared from information that is available on the public forum as with the Department of Agriculture. Further, data silos in the government that connect the same to the digitised land records will also be utilised for this purpose.
The government is currently in the conclusive stages of finalising the 'India Digital Ecosystem of Agriculture' (IDEA) that will prepare the framework for digital agriculture in the country.
It will subsequently create a Unified Farmers Service Interface, also referred to as Agristack, which will display all agriculture-related information in a federated platform.
The Agristack will reportedly lay down the foundation to explore upon the new emerging technologies to create new agri-focused solutions.
"The government aims to create a federated National Farmers Database and the digitised land records will be used as data attributes for creating this database," Union Minister Tomar mentioned in a written reply to the Rajya Sabha, as reported by The Economic Times.
He added, "To bring dynamism to the farmer's database, the linkage with the digital land record management system is essential."
This database is targeted towards providing personalised services like direct benefit transfer (DBT), irrigation facilities, seamless credit and insurance facilities, weather, soil, and plant health advisories.
The upcoming facility will also roll out details regarding fertilisers, pesticides, seeds, information concerning market access, peer-to-peer lending of farm equipment and logistical resources located nearby to users.
The minister revealed in the reply to the upper house that a special task force has been built for the further progress of this initiative.
Additionally, the concept paper on IDEA has circulated amongst domain experts, those hailing from the agro-industry, farmer producer organisations (FPOs), and the general public for overall comments and feedback.
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