Govt to geo-tag Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojna assets for better monitoring

It will help centre to prepare a better contingency plan to tackle drought

The government has decided to geo-tag all assets like farm ponds, soil testing labs and seed godowns created under the Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojna (RKVY) for their better utilisation.

A memorandum of understanding (MoU) was signed in this regard on Thursday between the National Remote Sensing Centre (NRSC), a wing of Indian Space Research Organisation, and RKVY division of the Agriculture Ministry.

NRSC will provide the required app and impart training to officials to facilitate uploading of photos of assets to the Bhuvan-RKVY platform.

"At present, there is manual details of RKVY assets and there is no transparency on their utilisation. With geo-tagging, the centre will have details of the assets and we can use them properly depending on demand and supply," Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh said at the event.

For instance, details of the number of farm ponds and water level through geo-tagging will help the centre to prepare a better contingency plan to tackle drought, he said.

Being aware of the realistic status of assets will not only be helpful in monitoring and utilising, but also in formulating development schemes for the sector, he added.

"It will also help in avoiding duplication and pave the way for harmonising a balance between the various schemes of the ministry," Singh said, adding that there is unlimited scope for agriculture development by utilising satellite and remote sensing technologies.

The agriculture minister further said that the space technology needs to be developed in areas such as land resource mapping, pesticides management, soil health mapping, crop yield estimation as well as the identification and assessment of floods like calamities, inland fisheries, animal species identification and sheep rearing.

Elaborating about the MoU, Agriculture Secretary Shobhna Pattanayak said that assets created under the RKVY in the last one decade will be identified for geo-tagging purpose. Even new assets that are being developed will also be tagged.

As many as 80 kinds of assets are created under the RKVY. A pilot project has already been implemented in four states of Odisha, Karnataka, Maharashtra and Bihar. As of now, 17,000 assets have been geo-tagged. Training is underway for 17 states.

NRSC officials said that it will complete the geo-tagging process of all assets of RKVY by end of 2017-18 financial year.