India, predominantly an agrarian nation, relies heavily on agriculture as the primary source of livelihood, particularly in rural areas. The Government through innovation and technology is trying to make the sector digitised in order to streamline and modernise this vital sector. The Agri Stack platform, a digital hub designed to bring together all stakeholders involved in agriculture, is one such endeavour.
What is Agri Stack?
The Agri Stack is an online platform with a primary aim of aligning the agriculture producers (farmers) and policymakers- Central Government and State Government under one digital umbrella.
Agri Stack was established by the Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare as an innovative platform which operates on an open, federated structure, with a core emphasis on State participation, ensuring inclusivity and collective evolution to shape the future of Indian agriculture.
Agri Stack’s core mantra is to facilitate easier access to essential services and resources for farmers, thereby enhancing productivity and ensuring better outcomes. By leveraging data and digital services, it aims to address key challenges faced by farmers, such as access to credit, quality inputs, expert advice, and market opportunities.
Agri Stack is enhancing the delivery of Government benefits and schemes to farmers efficiently and expeditiously and establishing a seamless identification and authentication system for farmers, eliminating the need for physical presence.
The platform aims to reduce the cost and risk associated with agricultural services, including credit, finance, and inputs, for farmers and service providers and foster innovation in agricultural products and services by providing easier access to high-quality data for Agri-Tech companies.
Sangeet Singla, Director (S&VO), DFPD said, “Agri Stack endeavours to revolutionise Indian agriculture by leveraging technology and collaboration, ultimately empowering farmers and catalysing sustainable growth in the sector. It will bring a lot of transparency and synergy among farmers, mandis, procurement agencies and other stakeholders”.
Commenting on the role of Agri Stack in the sugar industry, Singla said that the entire ecosystem of sugarcane/sugar would be digitised. The UP Government has developed a digital system on sugarcane, which we hope other States will follow suit.
Crop Registration
Another key role that this digital platform is playing is in crop registration. It aims to streamline, improve and make crop surveys fool-proof, through smartphones and image-based technology like drones etc.
As of now around 385 crops are registered under the Crop Registry Entity Identifier (Crop Code), wherein the Crop Name, Crop Type, Scientific Name, Crop Category and Vernacular names of the Crop are given.
