An Artificial Intelligence (AI) platform in the United States, Agtrinsic has announced the introduction of its Disease Intelligence Engine (DIE) for South Asia to help smallholder farmers better understand the risk of disease in crops.
The aim of this South Asia initiative is to put useful disease-related information directly into the hands of farmers who generally have limited access to modern agricultural services and early warning systems.
The Disease Intelligence Engine also helps agricultural experts, agricultural retailers and industry organizations to make more informed decisions.
In the first phase, the focus is on bringing advanced crop disease technology within the reach of smallholder farmers. Agtrinsic is working with a team based in the region to develop and bring a mobile application to the market.
The application is being developed according to the crops, disease risks, farming practices and language requirements of the region.
Smallholder farmers are an important part of regional agriculture and global food security. They produce food for their families, their communities and larger supply chains, but when facing disease, they have fewer technical, financial and advisory resources available to them compared with larger farms, says a press release.
“Historically, the farmers who could benefit the most from timely information about disease have been the ones with the least access to this information,” said Scott Plato, Director, Agronomy Innovation and Technology. “Our aim is to change this situation by making this technology practical, affordable and accessible to smallholder farmers.”
The other purpose of this technology is to help farmers identify potential disease risks earlier, prioritize field inspections and make more informed decisions regarding crop protection.
“We are not taking a product built for large-scale agriculture and simply placing it directly into a new market,” Plato said. “We are also working with people in the region to shape this experience naturally around the needs of local farmers, crops and rural communities.”
Agtrinsic expects the mobile application to support locally important crops and diseases and, through a simple digital platform, provide disease risk alerts, field-level information and practical decision-making support for farmers.
The company is also considering opportunities for collaboration with agricultural retailers, processors, exporters, cooperative organizations, spraying service providers and other organizations that support smallholder farmers.
The local team will support product development, adaptation to local needs, field testing, engagement with farmers and commercial launch. Agtrinsic believes that this local partnership approach will be very important to ensure that the technology proves relevant, reliable and usable in everyday farming decisions.
Meanwhile, Vice President of Agronomy, Matt Free said, “Protecting crop production is not only a local agricultural issue rather it is directly connected to food availability, rural employment and resilience of global food systems. When these farmers have better means of protecting their crops, the benefits will reach far beyond a single region.”
The South Asia launch is part of Agtrinsic’s broader effort to bring advanced disease-related information to different crops, farming systems and regions. The process of obtaining patent protection for this technology in the United States and internationally is ongoing.
Further details regarding the application, regional availability and field programs will be announced as development and testing progress.
It merits mentioned here that Agtrinsic develops Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based solutions for production agriculture and aims to make advanced agricultural information accessible to farms of all sizes and different production regions.
