With too many people producing too little on fields, it’s time for tech solutions in agriculture
Digitalisation is rapidly gaining momentum, with various sectors exploring better integration strategies and agriculture is no exception. Reforming agriculture with digitalisation has received significant emphasis, as was seen in 2024 Economic Survey and Union Budget.
The agriculture sector’s contribution to India’s GDP has declined over the years, from about 50 per cent at the time of Independence to around 18 per cent in 2022-23. Despite this decline, agriculture remains an important socio-economic sector as it ensures food security and remains a key driver of employment in India.
The urgency to introduce reforms in the agricultural ecosystem stems from many reasons. The sector poses a conundrum: Although it provides livelihood to more than 42 per cent of the population, it contributes a little over 18 per cent to the GDP.
Over the years, India has attempted to resolve this challenge in different ways. Digitalisation is rapidly gaining momentum, with various sectors exploring better integration strategies and agriculture is no exception. Reforming agriculture with digitalisation has received significant emphasis, as was seen in 2024 Economic Survey and Union Budget.
So far, the Indian experience has generated positive outcomes in deploying digital solutions and has led to the emergence of the Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) approach.
To harness digital solutions in agriculture, we must assess the sector’s landscape and get a grip on its persistent challenges. The consultation paper on the India Digital Ecosystem of Agriculture (IDEA) in 2021 proposed a detailed vision for systematic digitalisation of agriculture in India.
The relevance of digital tools for application in agriculture is well-established in many regions. As per Farmers’ Global Insights Survey, the European farmers are leading, with 55 per cent of farmers using digital tools to enhance productivity and practicing precision farming, with Canada closely following at 50 per cent. Japan has harnessed robotics and drone technology for precision farming.
Asia is at the lowest rank in adopting agri-tech products at a meagre nine per cent. The situation becomes particularly stark for India as the inequality in access to the internet remains low in rural areas where agriculture is practised on a larger scale.
India needs to accelerate its efforts to reform the agricultural sector with technological innovations as the core component while maintaining steady productivity and surplus, opting for sustainable practices, maintaining food security, and eliminating the vulnerabilities of the farmers, particularly small and marginal farmers.
A delay in action now could lead to significant setbacks. For instance, the World Bank assesses a loss of 5 per cent of GDP by 2030 in India on account of failure to adjust to climate change alone.
Digitalisation can provide the much-needed impetus to this ambitious goal as its scalability and modularity offer scope for innovation and tailor-made solutions.
India needs to accelerate its efforts to reform the agricultural sector with technological innovations as the core component while maintaining steady productivity and surplus, opting for sustainable practices, maintaining food security, and eliminating the vulnerabilities of the farmers, particularly small and marginal farmers
