MFM Rizwan presented on the use of digital applications in agricultural planning and pest/disease management. He discussed several types of digital applications including information sources, cultivation support, agribusiness planning, decision support, crop monitoring, marketing, pest surveillance, and productivity applications. He also described Sri Lanka's agriculture extension services and the role of extension agents. Rizwan explained several digital solutions used in Sri Lanka's agriculture sector including the Department of Agriculture website, agriculture videos/radio, a call center, mobile apps, and systems for crop forecasting, early warnings, e-phytosanitary certificates, and more. Finally, he discussed future initiatives like precision agriculture, smart farming, ICT advisory systems, and Sri

1. MFM Rizwan, Assistant Director of Agriculture (Development)
National Plant Quarantine Service
Department of Agriculture
Use of Digital Applications in Agricultural
Planning and Pest and Disease Management

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 Agriculture extension and role of agriculture extensionist
 Introduction to ICT for Agriculture / e-Agriculture
 Different categories /types of digital applications
• Information sources / agriculture technical support
• Cultivation technology support applications
• Agribusiness planning applications
• Decision support applications
• Crop health monitoring applications
• Marketing / ecommerce applications
• Pest surveillance applications
• Productivity applications
 Question and Answer
Content Outline

3. Agriculture Extension
Agricultural extension is the application of scientific research and knowledge
to agricultural practices through farmer education
(http://ag4impact.org)
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Research Agri. Extension Farmer

4. Agriculture Extension
 Delivery of information inputs to farmers
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Farming
Technology
Credit
Facility
Market
Information
Machinery
Weather
Inputs
availability
Soil & Fertility

5. Types Agriculture Extension Services
1. Technology transfer – the traditional model of the transfer of advice,
knowledge and information in a linear manner
2. Advisory – Agriculture experts or Subject Matter Specialist guiding
the farmers in relation to specific problems faced by them;
3. Facilitation – the aim of this model is to help farmers to define their
own problems and develop their own solutions
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6. Extension Agent
The extension agent is a change agent: She / he intervenes to bring about
change in order to help improve the lives of the farmers and their families.
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7. Role of Agriculture Extension Agent
Teacher Facilitator Organizer Arbitrator
Educator Broker Administrator Advocate
Leader Consultant Enabler Catalyst
Communicator Intermediary Activist Friend
Motivator Listener Provider Stimulator
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8. Trends in ICT Usage
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14. Digital Application Solutions
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15. Common Agricultural Policy
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16. Types of Digital Solutions
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• Information sources / agriculture technical support
• Cultivation technology support applications
• Agribusiness planning applications
• Decision support applications
• Crop health monitoring applications
• Marketing / ecommerce applications
• Pest surveillance applications
• Productivity applications

17. Digital Solutions
in Agriculture
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18. Department of Agriculture – www.doa.gov.lk
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19. Agriculture Videos on National TV
 Telecasted weekly / monthly
 Agriculture technology / Farmer success story
 Uploaded to YouTube , Vimeo to DOA website
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20. Online Agriculture Radio
 Recorded and real time broadcasting / Web streaming on
www.krushiradio.lk
 Live radio and collection of programmes accessible through online
 Listeners are Linked with SMSs
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21. 1920 Agriculture Advisory Service (Call Centre)
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 Food Crops, Coconut & Spice Crops
 20 Call Centre agents & supported with a KM Database
 Calls: Recorded in a database
 Krushi SMS service
1920.doa@gmail.com
1920servise@doa.gov.lk
+94 712 011920

22. Krushi TV

23.  Latest updates  45K+ Likes  Many Discussions
Department of Agriculture

24. Crop Forecasting Information System
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 Progress Monitoring tool of
National Food Production
Programme
 Provides the crop production
forecast / harvesting schedule

25. Decision support mechanism through Vegetable Early Warning System
Crop Forecasting Information System

26. Boga Purokathanaya App (Early Warning)

27. E-Phyto System
 Phytosanitary Certificate issuing system
 Department of Agriculture, Australia
 Supported by GoSL

28. Agri Staff Mobile App

30. Krushi Advisor App
 Available for download with play store

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Krushi Advisor App

32. Paddy Fertilizer App
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Paddy Fertilizer App

34. Coconut App by Coconut Cultivation Board

35. ICT Enabled Solutions:
Agriculture 4.0
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36. Industrial Revolution: Industry 4.0
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37. Revolution of Agriculture
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 Early 20th Century
 Labour intensive, low productivity
 Primarily subsistence agriculture
 Requires a vast number of small farms
Agriculture
1.0

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 Late of 1950, Green Revolution
 Supplemental nitrogen
 Synthetic pesticides & fertilizers
 Specialized machine
Agriculture
2.0 Revolution of Agriculture

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 late 1990
 Precision farming
 Military GPS signal available for public
 Mechanization
Agriculture
3.0 Revolution of Agriculture

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 A new boost in precision agriculture (early 2010)
 Cheap sensors and IoT devices / Automation
 Low cost micro-processor
 High bandwidth cellular communication & cloud based ICT
Agriculture
4.0 Revolution of Agriculture

41. What is Agriculture 4.0
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 The use of modern technologies
 integrated into one system (Inter connected system)
 to link farmers and other stakeholders within the agriculture value chain from land to consumer
 to improve food & agro-industrial production and delivery
 Utilizers the power of ICTs where information flow freely

42. Agriculture 4.0 : Scope
 Precision Agriculture: application of drone, robotic & artificial intelligent massively in
agriculture
 Smart Agro-industry: Optimize the resource utilization
 Digital Agro-logistic System: reduces the inefficiencies in agriculture value chain
 Smart E-Commerce System: efficient agriculture marketing
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43. Agriculture 4.0 : Why
 More Productive: consistent and use time and resources more efficiently
 Advantages to Farmers: ensures the highest level of return on investment
 Enables organizations to share information: across the traditional boundaries
 Environmental Friendly and Sustainable System: efficient use of resources and
minimizes the malpractices
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44. Agriculture 4.0 : Transformative Shift
Traditional Farming
Traditional SMEs
Traditional Services
Unskilled Labourers
Buy Technologies
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Smart Farming
Start Ups /
Entrepreneurs
High Value Services
Knowledge Workers
Make Technologies

45. Future Initiatives / Agriculture 4.0
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 Precision Agriculture
 Smart Farming / IoT (Internet of Things)
 ICT enabled Agriculture Advisory System supported with spatial data (NSDI)
 Digitalization in Farming
 Smart value chain management
 Agri Nerve Centre
 Sri Lanka E-Agriculture Strategy

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Precision Agriculture
Precision agriculture is
a farming management
concept based on
observing, measuring and
responding to inter and
intra-field variability in
crops.

47. Precision Agriculture
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48. Farmer Empowerment
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49. Review Revise Adopt

50. Agriculture based business planning and
project proposal formulation
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51. What is Rural Invest
 Methodology and software to plan, prepare and analyze business plans / investment
projects in a participatory, iterative and decentralized way
 A Toolkit comprised of :
• Software
• Training modules (exercises, case studies, presentations)
• E-learning and video tutorials
• Technical manuals
 A capacity development tool developed by FAO as a public good, contributing to FAO's
Strategic Objective 4 “enable inclusive and efficient agricultural food systems”
 Applied in many countries, in all continents, since 1998
 Available in 8 languages (Arabic, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Turkish,
Mongolian), If we want we can translate into our local languages as well
 It is participatory, interactive and bottom-up and designed to be used with communities,
entrepreneurs, government field technicians, project staff and local financing institutions.
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52. What is Rural Invest
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RuralInvest systematizes and standardizes the formulation,
analysis and results assessment so as to make proposals
and assessment framework comparable

53. What is Rural Invest
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54. What is Rural Invest
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55. Rural Invest : Module 1
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56. Rural Invest : Module 2
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57. Rural Invest : Module 2…
 Simplified / rapid analysis:
• Investment is detailed (and funding from own and external resources)
• Average year of full production is considered
• Compare existing and future situations
 Main indicators:
• Annual Income : verify that income cover operational and general expenses
• Net Annual Income: check that net income allows to replace the investment in the
future
• Number of years at full production to recover the investment
 Calculations can be made in the field with initiators and with the software
 Adapted for modelling, simple and low cost investments
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58. Module 3: Detailed Project Formulation & Analysis
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59. Module 3: Detailed Project Formulation & Analysis…
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60. Module 3: Detailed Project Formulation & Analysis…
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61. Module 4: Database management and M&E
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62. Why Rural Invest
 Investors themselves (entrepreneurs, MSMEs, producer organizations, individual
producers, communes, etc.)
 Field technicians who assist them (extension staff, business advisory consultants, credit
agents)
 Institutions that employ these technicians:
• Ministries (and investment & development projects)
• National Financial institutions (banks, MFIs, investment funds)
• NGOs, Federation of Producers’ organizations
• Business advisory service providers (consultants, consulting firms)
• Chambers of agriculture and commerce
• Learning and knowledge institutions (colleges and universities)
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63. Basic Principles of RuralInvest
 Reflects the priorities/views of the investors and promotes their participation in the
preparation and analysis of their investment proposals
 User friendly and simple for investors/technicians with little experience in project
preparation
 Make sure that investment proposals are appropriated, feasible and comparable
 Demonstrates the sustainability of the investment from the financial, economical,
operational, and environmental and social perspective
 Ensures high quality projects/ business plans proposals for financing
 Builds a database of projects for portfolio analysis and monitoring and evaluation
 throughout the project life cycle
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64. RuralInvest: Types of Projects
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65. Drones in Agriculture
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66. What is a Drone / UAV?
Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV)
an aircraft without a pilot onboard that has the ability to fly autonomously but
can also be controlled by remote
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67. What is a UAS?
Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS)
UAS includes the UAV and its associated elements,
including communication links and unmanned- aircraft
control components, which are required for the
operator to maneuver safely and efficiently in the
national airspace system.
 UAV
 ground control station
 Pilot
 visual observer
 launcher
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small Unmanned Aircraft System (sUAS)
- a system in which the UAV weighs less than 25kg

68. Common Drone Types
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69. A Typical Drone
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70. Common Drone Types
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Rotary Wing / Multirotor Drones
Advantages Disadvantages
• Vertical take-off and Landing • Shorter battery life
• Surveying or Surveillance • Multiple points of failure
Fixed wing Drones
Advantages Disadvantages
• Longer battery life • May need launcher device
• Better for large areas • Needs open area for takeoff / Landing

71. Agriculture Drones
 An agricultural drone is an unmanned
aerial vehicle used to help optimize
agriculture operations, increase crop
production, and monitor crop growth.
 Sensors and digital imaging capabilities
can give farmers a richer picture of
their fields.
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72. Sensors used in Drone Technology in Agriculture
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73. Application of Drones
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74. Application of Drones…
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75. Electromagnetic spectrum
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76. Normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI)
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77. Normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI)…
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Thank You
M.F.M. Rizwan
NPQS, Department of Agriculture
Email: rizwan.doa@gmail.com