Kamal Ghorui
NEW DELHI: Days after its announcement in the Budget, the agriculture ministry on Tuesday launched AI-enabled ‘Bharat-VISTAAR’ (Virtually Integrated System to Access Agricultural Resources) that will help farmers in farm-level decision-making by receiving date-driven customised digital advisory.Launched at a time when India is hosting the AI Impact Summit, Bharat-VISTAAR is a multilingual AI tool that will integrate the AgriStack portals and the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) package on farm practices with AI systems.Its use is expected to enhance farm productivity, enable better decisions for farmers and reduce risk by providing customised advisory support related to weather, market prices, pests and diseases, soil health, crop management, and information on major central govt schemes.Calling Bharat-VISTAAR a platform of “ask and get direct answers”, agriculture minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said farmers will neither have to make rounds of offices nor struggle with digital applications.“They will now just have to dial 155261 by picking up a mobile phone and ask any farm-related question. They will get immediate answer in one’s local language about which medicine (pesticide/insecticide) to apply, when to sow and what rates (of selling price of crops) are available in the markets of Jaipur, Jodhpur, Udaipur, Delhi or Mumbai,” Chouhan said while launching the first phase of Bharat-VISTAAR.The scheme, which is devised as an “AI-based digital security shield”, has initially been started in Hindi and English languages. Farmers will eventually be able to interact in 11 languages under the system in future.Chouhan said a farmer identity card was also being created under the system that would contain all information about the farmer. “Preparations are underway to connect the entire agricultural system with the Bharat VISTAAR scheme,” he added.Currently, a couple of central schemes such as ‘Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana’ and ‘Soil Health Card’ have been included in this scheme. Information about all major central schemes for farmers will be available through it in due course.The minister on the occasion also unveiled AI Hackathon focused on farmers and ‘Agri Kosh AI Strategy Roadmap’, emphasising innovative solutions for agricultural challenges.
