Syngenta And IoTechWorld Collaborates To Make Agricultural Drone Spraying Easier

Syngenta India has partnered with IoTechWorld Avigation to facilitate the "introduction of drone spraying" throughout India. Under the terms of this agreement, IoTechWorld and Syngenta will collaborate to create job opportunities for rural youth by training and preparing them to use drone technology in the farming industry. 

Both parties agree to collaborate to leverage their respective strengths intending to promote the spraying of Syngenta-approved chemicals in various Indian territories using IoTechWorld's drone technology. 

"In the first phase, 200 rural youth will be trained and hired to spray. Over 400 acres of large-scale trials were conducted, and data for 20 crops was submitted to regulators," explained Susheel Kumar, MD & Country Head Syngenta India. 

"The Central Insecticides Board, GOI, authorized Syngenta to be the first private company to use drones to spray its product on paddy in order to safeguard the crops from fungal infections, Blast, and Sheath Blight. Syngenta organized the first-ever Drone Yatra in response to this, as well as the policy push by the Government of India and several state governments. During this, a drone awareness van traveled 17,000 km in 13 states, connecting with 15,000 farmers and giving them drone spraying demonstrations," explained Sachin Kamra, Head, of Farmer Centric Ecosystem, Syngenta India.

"We are revolutionizing Indian spraying practices and advancing the country's agricultural mechanization. To help farmers maximize the benefits of plant protection chemicals, save money, and achieve better results, we want to collaborate with Syngenta. We also want to help create jobs in rural areas by developing agri-entrepreneurs," said Deepak Bhardwaj, Director of IoTechWorld Avigation.

"In addition to the joint efforts of Syngenta India and IoTechWorld, Syngenta Foundation India is engaged in the identification of suitable Agri Entrepreneurs (AEs) and the provision of drone pilot training to them. This will enable us to offer our AEs more opportunities to earn money. In the overall programme, the Foundation will act as a catalyst, and it will support this initiative going forward,” according to Rajendra Jog, Country Director of the Syngenta Foundation India.

Additionally, Syngenta and IoTech will collaborate closely to promote drone spraying technology in all educational and promotional campaigns, as necessary. They will also make efforts to support the deployment of at least 2000 drones under the programme for micro and village-level agricultural entrepreneurs as well as to train and develop rural youth.

"Agri-Entrepreneurs are trained by Syngenta in close collaboration with Syngenta Foundation India and provide a variety of agri and allied services to farmers. The National Institute of Agriculture Marketing identifies, trains, and certifies village youth to build businesses that increase smallholder farmer incomes, and efficiency, and reduce climate footprint through better and cheaper inputs, access to markets, credit, and insurance. The overall goal of this programme is to develop and anchor self-sustaining AEs to provide agriculture services to smallholder farmers in order to achieve three goals: creating rural jobs, improving agricultural incomes and practices, and advancing environmental sustainability."

As per the data of Syngenta India, so far, ten thousand nine hundred and eleven Agriculture Entrepreneurs have been trained across India.

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