India needs innovation

Time again we hear IT companies India boasting of its founders who made gazillion zillions. Yet most of these companies are servicing western countries. Yes they are creating jobs in India but they are contributing only about 5% to the economy while non IT industries such as agriculture are contributing to over 22%. agriculture in India has the potential to contribute even more by Indian IT graduates developing apps and tools for every day farmer. The following tools as I see it are required. I dont have the skills to develop them however I am throwing my ideas open to people to use for public good in India. Please let your fellow men/women with IT skills know.

1. Mobiles which wholly work in the local language preferably smart phones- if China has it why not India?

2. Kannada software written in Linux etc which will make it open domain.-for use in all computers

3. A cheap tablet costing less than rupees 1000.

4. Water monitoring in soils to reduce cost of irrigation- cheap tensio meters

5. Solar powered homes in all villages-forget coal and water driven projects

6. Online business training in local language for rural youth. Italians Germans French everyone have local language universities and India is behaving as a British colony even today by having all its technology in English. why?????

7. Online university for all to get proper degrees- no restriction on caste creed reservation

8. Pens that are able to capture written information and connect to a tablet to transfer information

10. WiFi freely available to everyone which transmits through the walls with kinetic energy stored in the double walls due to heating and cooling in the bricks.

11. Apps which help farmers to choose new varieties for high production in each local region provided in local language

13. Fertilizer apps where a farmer can put in figures and get information as to how much of fertilizer can be used per acre rather than excess

14. Apps which show IPM ie Integrated Pest Management strategy for each region

15. Apps to provide English training to rural youth in their language -ie an Indian Babel

16. Apps to provide basic education for illiterate farmers by training in alphabets to writing basic sentences

So here is the challenge for you all. If you care about India and if you have any skills in computer language coding then start the work.

Agriculture-What should PM Modi do now?

Indian agriculture contributes about 22% to its economy while manufacturing just above and IT about 5%. Agriculture has been languishing on the sidelines as farmers neither have the collective lobby nor the education and capacity to negotiate with the government like the western farmers do. Urban population and rural population are hardly connected except when farmers commit suicide or when onion prices go up. Successive govts have played the "aaam admi" card and have pretended to help the poor farmers. 

But their thinking need to change. Mr. Modi needs to turn the popular thinking on its head. He needs to stop treating farmers as a collective poor. Farming is an industry just like IT or manufacturing. PM Modi needs to start treating it similar to a small business. He should stop all the SOPS and subsidies. Restructure farming sector to enable it to grow as below. 

Provide incentives for following.

1. Soil testing and using appropriate levels of fertilizers.

2. Integrated Pest Managment strategy for use of chemcials.

3. Use of drip irrigation and fertigation.

4. Use of controlled traffic, minimum tillage rather than deep ripping of soils.

5. Control of weeds through mulching and soil rotation

6. Use of organic matter into soils

7. reducing use of synthetic nitrogen and using legumes to ass biological nitrogen

8. Managing waterways and rivers properly and not let fertilizers and rubbish getting into the rivers causing contamination.

Every farm should be registered as a small business. They needed to be provided with subsidized insurance, tax structure and market based crop growing and management. There should not be any subsides for fertilizer use but only subsidies for soil testing and training.

All irrigation should be made mandatory to do at night. Irrigation should be linked to soil sensors and excess of water usage should be stopped. Farmers should be provided with training for running the farm like a small business. India does not need more farmers it needs farm productivity without increasing land use. Proper use of fertilizers and water will save costs and water too.

If PM Modi treats Agriculture with respect and as an industry he can get the growth going and really help the rural economy to grow. Will he do so?