Parliament Question: Digital Agriculture Mission

GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE LOK SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 2602 TO BE ANSWERED ON THE 05TH AUGUST, 2025 DIGITAL AGRICULTURE MISSION 2602. SHRI MALAIYARASAN D: Will the Minister of AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE कृ(cid:874)ष एवं (cid:873)कसान क(cid:227)याण म(cid:287)ं ी be pleased to state: (a) the steps which have been taken to ensure that the Digital Agriculture Mission respects the rights and data privacy of farmers, particularly small and marginal farmers in Tamil Nadu; (b) the manner in which the Government plan to include and train farmers from rural and vernacular backgrounds to effectively use the digital tools introduced under the Mission; (c) the status of funds allocation and utilization under this Mission for Tamil Nadu; (d) whether the Government has consulted with the State Government of Tamil Nadu and other State Governments to tailor the Mission to local agricultural practices and challenges; and (e) the measures which are in place to ensure that the Mission does not exclude farmers without access to smartphones or reliable internet? ANSWER THE MINISTER OF STATE FOR AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE कृ(cid:874)ष एवं (cid:873)कसान क(cid:227)याण रा(cid:207)य म(cid:287)ं ी (SHRI RAMNATH THAKUR) (a) to (e): The Government has approved the Digital Agriculture Mission in September 2024. The Mission envisages the creation of a Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) for Agriculture, such as AgriStack, Krishi Decision Support System, and a comprehensive Soil Fertility & Profile Map to enable a robust digital agriculture ecosystem in the country. This, in turn, would drive innovative farmer-centric digital solutions and make reliable crop-related information available to all farmers on time. The AgriStack DPI consists of three foundational registries or databases associated with the agriculture sector, i.e., Geo- Referenced Village Maps, Crop Sown Registry and the Farmers Registry, all created and maintained by the State Governments/ Union Territories. At present, a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) has been signed with 30 States/UTs for the creation and implementation of the Digital Public Infrastructure, including the State of Tamil Nadu. The ownership of the data in Farmer Registry lies with the respective States. Apart from this, the Government of India also ensures strong data security in AgriStack, which is fully compliant with the Information Technology Act, 2000 and various other cyber securityguidelines of Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), Unique Identification Authority of India, Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In). AgriStack keeps farmer information encrypted so that only designated systems can read it. Secure Application Programming Interface (APIs) and token-based authentication govern all data exchange, ensuring controlled access to data. Moreover, the government conducts regular security audits of all these IT systems to protect the data stored in the IT systems. Additionally, farmer data from Agristack can only be shared with the explicit consent of the farmers via the consent manager framework in AgriStack. Further, although smart phones are becoming available and accessible to everyone, major telecom companies of India have reached almost every corner of the country with their services. However, additional steps have been taken to ensure that farmers who do not have mobile phones can also avail of the benefits of digital services. Such farmers can register themselves on Agristack and avail services and benefits by utilizing existing support facilities like Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs), Krishi Sakhis and Common Service Centres (CSCs). The States are also organizing camps so that no farmer is left out from the benefits of AgriStack. The Government is also making digital applications available in local languages such as, the Digital Crop Survey application being used in Tamil Nadu is in the regional language. The government is also providing administrative and technical support to all the States for the implementation of AgriStack. I. Providing training to the State officials. II. Software for Farmer ID and Digital Crop Survey. III. Support for hiring human resources for creating a Project Monitoring Unit. IV. Providing Cloud Infrastructure for implementing the project. V. The Department of Expenditure (DoE), Ministry of Finance, has announced a Scheme for Special Central Assistance (SCA) to States for Capital Investment during 2025-26 with a total allocation of Rupees 6000 Crores. VI. Further, the Government has advised the States to adopt a Camp-mode approach, under which financial assistance of Rs. 15,000 per camp has been provisioned to the States to encourage States to organize field-level camps and mobilise local administration. VII. To accelerate the creation and verification of Farmers’ Registry, Rs. 10/- per Farmer ID has been provisioned from the administrative fund of the PM KISAN Scheme. This amount will be utilized to provide an honorarium to the field functionaries involved in the creation of the Farmers’ Registry. The Digital Agriculture Mission has been designed in consultation with various Central Ministries, State Government/Union Territories through organization of National Conferences. Further, the challenges in implementation of AgriStack are also monitored by the Steering Committee which comprises the Central Government officials along with State Government representatives. Further, regular meetings are held with State-level officials to incorporate inputs for tailoring the mission to specific agro-climatic and socio-economic conditions. The State of Tamil Nadu has been allocated Rs. 29.934 Crore as Central share to conduct DCS under the Digital Agriculture Mission. *****