GeoSense

With inclement climatic conditions, and the much aware global climatic changes, the rural community is facing uncertainty in their livelihoods. They need timely assistance to combat the situation. More stress was given to combat global warming/climate change aspects in the bilateral matters between the Prime Ministers of India and Japan during the August 2007 visit of the Hon. Prime Minister of Japan to India. GeoSense initiative, with high density sensor network coupled with the Geo-ICT and grid-computing aids, assist the decision makers to monitor not only monitor the onset of drought or any unpleasant weather/climatic conditions but also monitor the crop conditions/productivity/soil health/soil moisture or any dynamic situations that the rural communities require in a (near) real time mode.

AgriSens and FieldServers are deployed in the research farm of AgroMet Division of ANGRAU at Rajendranagar, Hyderabad, where long term weather-based experiments are being carried out on precision agriculture/climate change (precision irrigation, pest/nitrogen management, coping/mitigation strategies, etc.) aspects.

The GeoSense web interface in the rural systems will have more advantages over the traditional systems: centralized control over data and model (i.e. low cost of SW and HW, maintenance, training, etc.), global and easy accessibility, interconnectivity, model propagation, education platform, and more importantly interconnectivity/ coordination/ flexibility in decision making/participatory decision making (Geo-ICT advantages); and high density monitoring, robustness, cost-effectiveness and easy maintenance (sensor network advantages). Different and dynamic parameters like soil moisture, weather/environmental conditions, crop growth/health, etc. can be obtained from the sensors and passed on to the rural stakeholders for their use. This will allow the farmers to relate the obtained data to the ground reality and take necessary actions for their respective fields.