Govt to combine old, modern tech for crop forecast: Anant

The Centre is weighing combining traditional and modern technologies like yield estimate and satellite imagery to ensure accurate farm output forecast, Chief Statistician T C A Anant said today.
"The Centre is working on a combination of traditional and modern technology like satellite imagery for crop acreage and yield estimation to build up a much more sophisticated analysis and ensure accurate agriculture forecasts," Anant said here while addressing an event of Geospatial Technologies in India.
"If we can combine traditional technology of acreage, yield estimation with satellite imagery, which is possible through a small hand-held device... it will be possible for you to not only get the estimates... but also the geospatial coordinates... This is one work which is now in progress," an Assocham statement quoted him as saying.

He further said, "The technology is there, apps have been developed, it is a question of working with all state officials and there is huge administrative machinery out in districts to adopt it, that is one work which is going on."
He was optimistic that as it gets more deeply embedded, it will help in further improving the quality of forecast in agriculture.
The National Remote Sensing Centre (NRSC) is also working on using geospatial technology while undertaking sample surveys.

"We have entered into a partnership with the NRSC to modernise our system of developing urban sample frames. We would be combining the satellite image of urban areas, readily available on Bhuvan, with ground-mapping of the satellite image to permit you to develop an urban frame," he said.

"The advantage of this is that it is updated much more frequently than any physical ground survey system could have done," he added. Once the work on Urban Frame Survey (UFS) is complete, "we will have up-to-date maps of urban areas which can be used for sampling purposes with necessary location indicators and so on more rapidly".
According to Anant, similar exercises are possible in many areas. "Though the possibility has been laid out, the challenge for us is to actually make it possible by integrating technology like satellite imagery across a wide range of government activities," he added.
"We are working also with all the ministries and ISRO etc to ensure that for a whole bunch of major development indicators, these are also made available to the public in a single harmonised portal which can allow people to see things conveniently," reasoned Anant.

The government's objective is to ensure last-mile development, with use of geospatial technologies.