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Driving Agricultural Transformation through Digital Innovation

Written by rpuri on . Posted in Feature.

By

Prasun Gangopadhyay, Borlaug Institute for South Asia (BISA)

In the digital age, agriculture is undergoing a profound transformation powered by advanced technologies. The integration of digital tools is not only enhancing productivity but also building resilience against climate change and market volatility. From on-ground intelligence to remote sensing and advanced data analytics, these technologies are reshaping how farmers manage resources, mitigate risks, and maximize yields. This digital revolution in agriculture is not just about efficiency but also about sustainability and informed decision-making. Here, we explore how these technologies are driving agricultural transformation, their impacts on the value chain, and how they are paving the way for policy reorientation to support a more resilient agricultural ecosystem.

On-ground Intelligence and Crowdsourcing

On-ground intelligence is the cornerstone of modern digital agriculture. It involves collecting real-time data directly from the field, enabling farmers to monitor crop health, soil conditions, and pest infestations with unprecedented accuracy. This intelligence is increasingly being crowdsourced, empowering farmers to actively contribute to data collection and share localized insights. Crowdsourcing platforms allow farmers to report pest outbreaks, disease prevalence, and weather anomalies, which are then aggregated to create a comprehensive landscape-level picture. This collective intelligence not only enhances early warning systems but also fosters community resilience. Farmers can make timely decisions, such as adjusting irrigation/ fertilizer schedules or applying pest management solutions, to optimize inputs and safeguard yields. The collaborative nature of crowdsourcing also builds social capital and knowledge networks, ensuring that best practices are shared across farming communities.

Remote Sensing with UAVs, Satellites, and Handheld Instruments

Remote sensing technologies are revolutionizing agricultural monitoring and management. Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), satellites, and handheld instruments like GreenSeeker are transforming how farmers gather data about their fields. UAVs provide high-resolution aerial imagery, enabling precise mapping of crop health, soil moisture, and nutrient deficiencies. Satellites offer a broader perspective, delivering real-time data on weather patterns, temperature fluctuations, and drought risks. Meanwhile, handheld devices such as GreenSeeker measure crop vigor and nitrogen content, helping farmers optimize fertilizer use. These technologies facilitate precision agriculture, ensuring that inputs such as water, fertilizers, and pesticides are applied efficiently and sustainably. By reducing resource wastage and enhancing productivity, remote sensing tools not only increase profitability but also minimize the environmental footprint of farming practices.

Data Analytics, Information Integration, and Knowledge Dissemination

The massive influx of data from on-ground sensors, UAVs, satellites, and crowdsourced inputs necessitates advanced data analytics for meaningful interpretation. Machine learning algorithms and artificial intelligence (AI) models are being used to analyze complex datasets, identify patterns, and generate predictive insights. Data analytics empower farmers with actionable information, such as yield forecasts, pest and disease outbreaks, and market price fluctuations. Moreover, information integration and reanalysis allow the consolidation of diverse data sources into unified platforms, enhancing decision-making. Blockchain technology is also being leveraged to ensure data security, transparency, and traceability, building trust across the agricultural value chain. This integration creates dynamic agricultural intelligence systems that continuously learn and adapt, ensuring that farmers receive timely and accurate recommendations. For instance, real-time weather updates combined with soil moisture data can provide irrigation alerts, optimizing water usage and preventing crop stress. Additionally, effective knowledge dissemination through digital platforms, mobile applications, and social media ensures that farmers access tailored advisory services, best practices, and market information. This empowers them to make informed decisions and adapt to changing climatic conditions.

Impact Assessment and Policy Reorientation

Digital agricultural technologies are driving significant impacts across the value chain, including productivity gains, input efficiency, and environmental sustainability. To evaluate these impacts, advanced impact assessment tools are being deployed, measuring outcomes such as yield improvements, resource optimization, and risk mitigation. These assessments provide valuable feedback, enabling continuous improvement of digital interventions. Furthermore, the insights generated from impact assessments inform policy reorientation. Policymakers can leverage evidence-based data to create an enabling environment for digital agriculture by enhancing rural connectivity, providing credit/ subsidy for technology adoption, and promoting sustainable agricultural practices. This strategic policy reorientation not only enhances farmers’ livelihoods but also contributes to national food security and climate resilience. As digital agriculture continues to evolve, policy frameworks must be adaptive and inclusive, ensuring that smallholder farmers, women, and marginalized communities benefit from technological advancements.

BISA’s Role in Advancing Digital Agriculture

The Borlaug Institute for South Asia (BISA) is revolutionizing agriculture through digital technologies, empowering farmers and enhancing agricultural value chains. BISA developed comprehensive digital databases and spatial tools to provide real-time weather forecasts, climatic risk assessments, and best practices, helping farmers optimize input efficiency and manage pest and disease outbreaks. By integrating artificial intelligence, BISA enabled real-time pest management, reducing crop losses and minimizing environmental impacts.

To estimate agricultural production before harvest, BISA co-developed the CCAFS Regional Agriculture Forecasting Tool (CRAFT), providing predictive insights for strategic planning. Additionally, BISA’s use of advanced digital tools, such as Phenocart, UAVs, handheld sensors, and digital cameras, enhanced the efficiency of High Throughput Phenotyping (HTP) in breeding trials.

One of BISA’s flagship initiatives is the Atlas of Climate Adaptation in South Asian Agriculture (ACASA), offering granular-scale information on climate hazards, exposure, vulnerability, impacts on key commodities, and adaptation options for future climate scenarios. ACASA supports stakeholders in investment targeting, decision-making, and policy formulation, benefiting governments, agribusinesses, donors, and adaptation-focused organizations.

Through these initiatives, BISA demonstrates how digital agriculture can enhance food security, economic prosperity, and climate resilience, paving the way for sustainable practices and resilient farming communities in South Asia.

CONSERVATION AGRICULTURE FOR SUSTAINABILITY, FOOD AND NUTRITION SECURITY IN A CHANGING CLIMATE

Written by rpuri on . Posted in News.

Authored By

Dr. S. Pazhanisamy, Dr. R.K. Jat, Dr. Shubham Durgude, Subhayan Das, Pankaj Kumar and Mahesh Maske

Agriculture faces significant challenges like climate change, soil degradation, and resource depletion. These challenges highlight the issues with conventional practices like intensive tillage and mono-cropping, which degrade soil fertility and threaten food security. One of the primary challenges of the present time is of feeding a growing and increasingly affluent world population (9.8 billion by 2050) with reduced external inputs and minimal environmental impacts. With national partners, BISA is implementing the Climate Resilient Agriculture Programs, covering about 251,000 acres with a success rate of coverage of 99.66%. Conservation Agriculture (CA) ensures resilient, sustainable farming systems while stabilizing yields across various cropping seasons.

Minimum Soil Disturbance-Revitalizing Soils through Zero Tillage:

The core principle of CA is Minimum Soil Disturbance, which helps mitigate soil damage, loss of organic matter, and erosion caused by conventional tilling practices. BISA advocates for direct seed planting into undisturbed soil using Zero-Till Planters, ensuring optimal seed placement for uniform germination. Permanent Raised Beds has further improved productivity in waterlogged areas during the Kharif season and enhanced water use efficiency in Rabi season. Over 13 years of field experiments at the BISA research station in Bihar demonstrate that Zero Tillage improves soil health and increases crop yields by up to 20%, underscoring its importance for sustainable soil management and long-term agricultural stability.

Picture: a) Soil health under zero tillage plot and b) Soil health under conventional tillage plot at BISA farm, Samastipur, Bihar

Permanent Soil Cover: Enriching Soil with Residue Management:

Permanent soil cover, a key principle of CA, protects soil from erosion, retains moisture, and enhances fertility by covering the soil with crops or residues. BISA promotes Crop Residue Management, encouraging farmers to maintain residues instead of burning them. This reduces soil degradation, suppresses weeds, and enriches soil organic matter, improving productivity by 20-30% and increasing agricultural resilience while lowering environmental impact.

Picture: (a) Maize grown on rice residue with surface mulch at BISA Pusa, Samastipur (Bihar), and (b) wheat under intensive residue management at BISA Jabalpur (MP)

Crop Diversification-Building Resilience through Alternative Cropping Systems

Agricultural sustainability in Central and Eastern India is threatened by soil degradation, water stress, and climate change due to the monoculture like rice-wheat. Crop diversification under Conservation Agriculture (CA) integrates millets (pearl millet, sorghum), pulses (chickpeas, lentils, pigeon peas), and oilseeds (mustard, groundnut, sesame) to enhance soil fertility, water efficiency, and reduce chemical dependency. BISA Jabalpur (Madhya Pradesh) focuses on multi-season farming, while BISA Pusa, Bihar (Bihar) promotes alternative cropping systems in the Indo-Gangetic Plains. Through Climate-Resilient Agriculture (CRA) interventions, BISA has introduced 14 diversified systems, achieving 92% timely rice planting, 80% early harvesting, and 20–30% yield increases, with 24% higher crop diversification. These efforts stabilize farm incomes, improve food security, and enhance climate resilience, ensuring a sustainable agricultural future.

Picture: (a) Diversified millet crops grown at the BISA research farm at Pusa, Samastipur, (b) demonstration at a climate-smart village plot in Katihar, Bihar (c)Crop diversification trial at, BISA research farm at Jabalpur, MP and (d)sugarcane-chickpea intercropping farmers participatory trial at Narsinghpur, MP.

How Conservation Agriculture Enhances Food and Nutrition Security?

By substituting mono-crop systems like rice-wheat with diverse, nutrient-rich alternatives such as millets, pulses, and vegetables, CA enhances food and nutritional security. Rich in vitamins and minerals, these crops help address micronutrient deficiencies in rural areas. Sustainable practices like zero tillage and crop residue management contribute to the buildup of soil organic matter, improving nutrient uptake and boosting the nutritional content of harvested crops. This approach reduces reliance on chemicals and promotes the production of healthier, residue-free crops. CA, through its ability to stabilize yields under climate stress and foster dietary diversity, ensures local food self-sufficiency, reduces the need for imports, and supports the development of healthier, more resilient communities through sustainable farming practices.

Empowering Farmers through Capacity Building and Knowledge Transfer

BISA’s Climate Resilient Agriculture program has played an essential role in scaling CA practices. In the last four years, it has reached about 433,000 farmers in Bihar, making them aware of climate-smart and conservation agriculture practices. Engaging 380 villages across 38 districts, Bihar is emerging as a hub for sustainable agriculture. With focused efforts, over 80,000 farmers are adopting the advanced techniques from the CRA Programme, addressing climate challenges and improving productivity.

Government of Madhya Pradesh, in collaboration with the BISA launched the Climate Resilient Agriculture program in 9 districts of Madhya Pradesh based on an existing production system that lacks technological advancement. This initiative aims to improve resource use efficiency and farm incomes in the state. The project uses a participatory approach, involving farmers in evaluating location-specific interventions. In almost a year, it has reaching-out more than 3000 farmers in Madhya Pradesh, making them aware about climate resilient agriculture along-with farmers participatory trials in around 50 blocks in nine districts of Madhya Pradesh.

BISA focuses on capacity building and knowledge transfer, empowering farmers through hands-on training programs. Over 90,000 stakeholders have been engaged, 38% of whom are young farmers, ensuring a generational shift towards sustainable practices.

The Training of Trainers (ToT) initiative has created a network of skilled individuals to promote CA in their communities. Scaling these practices through field demonstrations, exposure visits, and knowledge-sharing activities has involved more than 1,600 villages in India and Nepal, highlighting their role in achieving agricultural sustainability and resilience. Bihar continues to be the central hub for these efforts, pushing the integration of CA into livelihood security and food security under climate challenges.

Picture: Building farmer capacity through digital applications, on-farm, and residential training programs.

Impact of Conservation Agriculture: Achieving Sustainability, Food Security, and Improved Nutrition

BISA promotes CA through its CRA and other programs, such as the Climate Smart Village Approach, offering a transformative model for sustainable farming. Practices like zero-till, crop residue management, and diversified cropping systems improve soil health, conserve water, and stabilize yields despite climate challenges. This ensures food security and farm profitability and strengthens environmental resilience. In Bihar, CA has transformed over 10,000 farmers’ fields, while in Madhya Pradesh, more than 2,500 farmers’ fields are improving soil health, conserving resources, and boosting productivity. Through CRA interventions, BISA has implemented over 14 diversified systems in Bihar and Madhya Pradesh, achieving 92% of rice planting before July 31 and 80% of harvest by November 30. These efforts have resulted in 20-30% yield increases, stabilized incomes, improved food security with nutrient-rich crops, and contributed to a 24% increase in diversification in CRA villages compared to non-CRA.

As CA expands across India, it leads the way to a sustainable future driven by innovation, research, and the empowerment of farmers.

Acknowledgments

BISA extends its heartfelt thanks to the governments of Bihar and Madhya Pradesh for their funding support, as well as to all partners and farmers for their enthusiastic participation. The editing by Prof. Arun K. Joshi, MD BISA is gratefully acknowledged.

Crop Diversification in Punjab: Challenges and Opportunities

Written by rpuri on . Posted in News.

By Pardeep Kumar, BISA

Key stakeholders and representatives from Govt. of Punjab and ICAR institutions with Shri Ajit Bal Joshi,  Secretary Agriculture, Govt of Punjab visiting maize hybrids fields at BISA Ludhiana station.

Crop Diversification in Punjab: Challenges and Opportunities

Agriculture has been the backbone of Punjab’s economy, making it one of India’s most agriculturally prosperous states. However, the state’s heavy reliance on traditional cropping patterns, mainly wheat and rice, has resulted in significant ecological, economic, and social challenges. Crop diversification could be the key to addressing these issues, paving the way for sustainable agricultural development.

Current Scenario in Punjab Agriculture

The Green Revolution in the 1960s transformed the state of Punjab into India’s breadbasket. The state’s agricultural growth has relied mainly on wheat and rice, significantly contributing to the country’s food grain stocks. However, the rice-wheat cropping system, though highly productive, has caused a range of environmental and other second-generation problems. These include low input-use efficiency, nutrient deficiencies, soil health deterioration, residue burning, and reduced productivity. Additionally, pesticide overuse and improper application have led to pest, disease, and weed management challenges. The rise of herbicide-resistant weed species is further threatening the sustainability of both rice and wheat production. Moreover, this mono-cropping system has caused an alarming decline in water tables due to excessive groundwater extraction for rice cultivation. The relentless cultivation of rice also depletes groundwater, with over 200,000 hectares added to rice farming in the past decade alone, further stressing the ecosystem and depleting biodiversity.

Challenges in Promoting Crop Diversification

  1. Economic Barriers:
    • Farmers’ reliance on Minimum Support Price (MSP) for wheat and rice reduces the incentive to switch to alternative crops like maize, pulses, and oilseeds.
    • Unstable markets and fluctuating prices for crops like soybean and vegetables make diversification risky.
  2. Infrastructure Deficiencies:
    • Limited storage facilities and food processing units for non-cereal crops.
    • Irrigation systems are tailored for water-hungry crops (like rice and spring maize), with no pricing for groundwater, making it challenging for farmers to shift.
  3. Knowledge and Skill Gaps:
    • Limited awareness among farmers about the benefits of crop diversification.
    • Insufficient training programs on modern techniques for cultivating alternative crops.
  4. Policy and Institutional Hurdles:
    • Policies are heavily skewed towards wheat and rice production.
    • Delayed implementation of diversification schemes and lack of coordinated efforts among stakeholders are key bottlenecks.
  5. Fragmentation of Landholdings:
    • The average landholding size in Punjab has been decreasing, making it challenging for farmers to experiment with new crops or adopt mechanization for diversified farming.
  6. Debt and Financial Stress:
    • High levels of farmer debt, exacerbated by input-intensive farming practices, leave little financial capacity to invest in crop diversification.
  7. Environmental Constraints:
    • Continuous mono-cropping has led to a rise in pest infestations and diseases, which could also affect new crop varieties.
    • Salinity issues in certain regions limit the suitability of soils for alternative crops.
  8. Market Inefficiencies:
    • Weak market linkages and inadequate price realization for perishable crops discourage farmers from diversifying beyond staples.

Opportunities for Crop Diversification

BISA Refreshers working on maize hybrid screening

Crop diversification presents several opportunities to improve the sustainability and profitability of Punjab’s agriculture. One key opportunity is sustainable resource use, where shifting to less water-intensive crops like maize, pulses, and millet can help mitigate water scarcity. Additionally, adopting integrated farming systems that combine crops, livestock, and agroforestry can enhance resource efficiency. Kharif maize cultivation offers another viable alternative to water-intensive rice. Maize requires significantly less water, making it well-suited for Punjab’s agro-climatic conditions. Its cultivation can help restore soil fertility through crop rotation while reducing groundwater dependency. Furthermore, the growing demand for maize in the animal feed and starch industries provides an assured market potential.

Numerous public and private agricultural research organizations have been developing sustainable and profitable cropping systems suited to local conditions for Kharif-maize-based crop diversification. Successful examples for Punjab include systems like maize-wheat-green gram, maize-potato-wheat, maize-potato-onion, and maize-potato-mentha, among others. These systems offer opportunities to replace rice and wheat, improving soil fertility and generating additional income based on regional demand.

From an economic perspective, high-value horticultural crops like fruits and vegetables provide better profit margins while encouraging organic farming and niche markets, which can open new income streams for farmers. Another benefit is improved soil and ecosystem health, as diversified cropping patterns reduce soil degradation and improve biodiversity. Crop rotation and intercropping practices naturally replenish soil nutrients, supporting long-term agricultural sustainability.

Finally, government initiatives and schemes like the National Mission on Sustainable Agriculture (NMSA) and Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana (RKVY) actively support diversification efforts. Punjab’s initiatives, including crop insurance and subsidy programs, can also be leveraged to promote the adoption of alternative crops, further supporting the transition to a more diversified agricultural system.

Way Forward

  • Policy Reforms: Revising MSP policies to include alternative crops and ensuring timely procurement can encourage farmers to diversify.
  • Infrastructure Development: Establishing food processing units, storage facilities, and efficient supply chains for diversified crops.
  • Capacity Building: Organizing awareness campaigns, workshops, and training programs to educate farmers on sustainable practices and market opportunities.
  • Research and Development: Focusing on high-yield and climate-resilient varieties of alternative crops.
  • Public-Private Partnerships: Encouraging private investment in agri-business and value chain development.

Conclusion

Crop diversification in Punjab has become a necessity, not just an option, to ensure the state’s agricultural sustainability and resilience. The overreliance on traditional cropping systems, such as the rice-wheat rotation, has led to numerous environmental, economic, and social challenges. By addressing these issues and capitalizing on available opportunities, Punjab can transition from a resource-intensive monoculture to a diversified and sustainable agricultural system. This shift is vital for securing farmers’ livelihoods, fostering long-term agricultural health, boosting national food security, and restoring ecological balance.

Diversification offers numerous benefits, including better soil health, reduced water usage, and improved pest management. It also opens new avenues for income generation through high-value crops like fruits, vegetables, and organic produce, which can contribute to the local economy. Moreover, integrating sustainable farming practices can ensure that Punjab remains a vital agricultural hub for future generations.

In collaboration with the Government of Punjab and other key stakeholders, BISA has actively promoted and facilitated sustainable crop diversification options. These efforts focus on educating farmers, improving infrastructure, and creating robust market linkages for alternative crops. By working with farmers and industry partners, this initiative aims to create a thriving, diversified agricultural system that benefits the environment and the communities that depend on it. Through these combined efforts, Punjab can lead the way in transitioning to a more resilient and sustainable agricultural model.

Can Climate-Smart Solutions in Agriculture Address Women’s Triple Drudgery?

Written by rpuri on . Posted in News.

Exploring how climate-smart solutions can reduce women’s triple burden of household labor, farm work, and caregiving—paving the way for gender-responsive adaptation in agriculture.

Pictures – BISA

By Riya Gupta

Traditional gender roles often assign women the primary responsibility for preparing food and securing water and fuel. Climate-induced challenges, such as erratic rainfall and prolonged droughts, complicate these tasks, forcing women to travel greater distances to find water and firewood. In agriculture, women predominantly engage in labour-intensive activities like planting, weeding, and harvesting. Climate variability increases the unpredictability of these tasks, leading to longer working hours under strenuous conditions. As primary caregivers, women are also expected to manage household duties and childcare, roles that become increasingly demanding during climate-related crises. This cumulative burden leaves little time for rest or personal development, perpetuating cycles of poverty and gender inequality.

Implementing Climate-Smart Agriculture (CSA) offers promising avenues to reduce women’s labour burdens and enhance their resilience. Technologies and practices under CSA such as Direct-Seeded Rice (DSR), stress-tolerant crop varieties, early planting, zero tillage, and micro or supplementary irrigation have demonstrated potential in this regard. DSR, for instance, which eliminates the need for transplanting (task traditionally performed by women) by sowing seeds directly into the field, has shown the improvement in productivity and a decrease in drudgery for women (Khatri et al. 2020)[i]. In the case of zero tillage, a good uptake is observed amongst women farmers more than males (Adzawla et al. 2019)[ii] as it reduces the physical labour by eliminating the need for traditional ploughing.

With the evidence around the globe suggesting CSA practices and technologies benefitting women, a trend of gendered adoption persists due to regional social exclusion, norms, and practices. Therefore, addressing the intersection of climate change and gender requires a deep understanding of the unique challenges faced by women in agriculture. Fostering the right enabling environment is essential to bridging this gender divide, ensuring that women have the knowledge, resources, and institutional support needed to adopt climate-smart solutions effectively.

Several studies have highlighted a diverse range of enablers to bring a parity in the adoption of CSA practices and technologies. Some key themes evolve around providing incentives to female farmers through supportive institutional policies, enhancing their skills and awareness through field trainings about farming technologies and implements, strengthening their social capital (such as self-help groups and community networks), and ensuring an easy access to different forms of credit and market. Benefits of creating right enabling environment has been highlighted by the researchers. For example, when the community women received proper agricultural training and learned how to manage their family finances, they were able to make the most of solar-powered drip irrigation in the Lombok Island of Indonesia. As a result, their harvests increased by 25%–40% within just one planting season (Siantoro et al. 2023)[iii].

Ensuring equitable resilience also demands modern tools, data-driven decision-making, and targeted interventions that empower vulnerable and marginalized groups—particularly women. In this context, the Atlas of Climate Adaptation in South Asian Agriculture (ACASA), led by BISA, is pioneering South Asia’s first climate adaptation Atlas by assessing climate change impacts on agriculture for both current and future. The project is aiming to map climate-smart technologies and practices with a gender-sensitive lens for both crops and livestock commodities in South Asia. A thorough literature review is being conducted combined with the expert judgment to validate technologies and practices for gender-suitability. A preliminary analysis of the literature shows the relation of CSA technologies and practices with the drudgery reduction for women particularly in relation to DSR, machine transplanted rice, and dual-crop varieties. This is supplemented with discussion around barriers to adoption and importance of credit, market, skilling, awareness, influence of household dynamics, decision-making on the technology adoption to reduce drudgery for women involved in farming.

Scaling such efforts is not just important—it’s necessary. Gender-responsive adaptation options must be integrated into climate strategies to ensure that CSA benefits reach those who need them the most. By reducing the time and physical labor required in agriculture, CSA has the potential to ease women’s triple burden of farm work, household chores, and caregiving. But for this to happen, technologies and practices must be designed and implemented with a gender-sensitive approach. The conversation around climate adaptation cannot ignore women’s realities. It’s time to prioritize solutions that not only improve productivity but also promote equity—because when women thrive, entire communities benefit.

[i] Khatri-Chhetri, A., Regmi, P.P., Chanana, N. et al. Potential of climate-smart agriculture in reducing women farmers’ drudgery in high climatic risk areas. Climatic Change 158, 29–42 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-018-2350-8

[ii] Adzawla, W., Azumah, S. B., Anani, P. Y., & Donkoh, S. A. (2019). Gender perspectives of climate change adaptation in two selected districts of Ghana. Heliyon, 5(11).

[iii] Siantoro, A., Purba, E. C., Agung, A. A. N., Tumewu, B., Tambunan, E., Silalahi, K., & Novita, F. (2023). Solar-powered drip irrigation managed by women farmer groups as climate change adaptation for gender equality and social inclusion in East Lombok, Indonesia. In Climate Change, Community Response and Resilience (pp. 153-173). Elsevier.