Using mass media campaigns to promote safer pesticide use
Multiple channels work best when sharing information about safer pesticide use Giving farmers the tools they need to make pesticide use safer is vital. Mass media campaigns can help to share pesticide information with them. But the campaigns work best when they’re delivered using multiple forms of communication.
These e-Plant Doctors Can Help Solve Farmers’ Crop Woes in Minutes. Here’s How.
This article was originally published on ‘the better india’ When K Pathi noticed the notorious Fall ArmyWorm attack his corn plants, he didn’t rush to get pesticides. He did something entirely different. When 49-year-old K Pathi, a farmer in Maramadakki village in Pudukkottai district of Tamil Nadu, noticed the notorious Fall ArmyWorm (locally known as…
Lockdown unlocking technology for India’s farmers
This article was originally published in indigenus, a blog from Nature India Rural communities grappling with livelihood issues and looking for support for farming activities are increasingly embracing technology for survival. Jayashree Balasubramanian, who heads communication at the M S Swaminathan Research Foundation (MSSRF) in Chennai, talks of her experience with farmers attending virtual ‘plant clinics’.
Teaching an app to help farmers
CABI and the start-up Plantix work together to improve the Plantix farmer app. As a result, the app is now able to detect several diseases for the first time. Worldwide, farmers face huge problems when pests and diseases threaten their crops. The stakes are high and the task to identify precisely the cause of the…
Pests in a pandemic? India’s plant doctors will see you online now
This article was originally published by the Thomson Reuters Foundation. During coronavirus lockdown, Indian farmers have been able to join ‘e-clinics’ to get a diagnosis of problems plaguing their crops, helping limit the damage When Victor, Mary’s husband, decided to travel abroad for work, he left her a plot of land to cultivate in southern…
Lockdown support: farmers dial in to agri-experts for help
This article was originally published the M. S. Swaminathan Research Foundation website The phone never stopped ringing at this one place in Pudukkottai district, Tamil Nadu all through April 1st. The event was a special phone-in program organized by MSSRF in collaboration with Department of Agriculture, Krishi Vigyan Kendra (KVK), Vamban. Agriculture advisors and farmers…
Plantwise trials image recognition app Plantix in India
Plantwise and the German-based company PEAT (Progressive Environmental & Agricultural Technologies) are about to conduct an 18-month pilot study to assess the benefits of PEAT’s smartphone app Plantix, which can help to diagnose plant pests, diseases and nutrient deficiencies in the field.