Grand Challenge: Adoption rate of advanced farming remains poor

Grand Challenge Topic: Adoption rate of advanced farming remains poor Sector: Agriculture

Sub-sector: high-tech-farming

Code: GC_AGRI_25_02

Date of publishing: 07 August 2025

Last Updated: 10 August 2025

Overview

Modern agricultural practices, such as precision farming, hydroponics, and climate-resilient seeds, have the potential to significantly increase yields and improve farmer incomes. Precision farming, drip irrigation, and improved seed varieties can increase crop yields by 30-70%. However, adoption remains under 30% due to lack of extension services and high initial costs. India’s post-harvest losses (~20-30%) further reduce farm incomes, amounting to ₹92,000 crore ($11 billion) annually.

Categories of Challenges

1. High capital costs for advanced farming equipment (hydroponics, drones, sensors) deter smallholder adoption.

2. Knowledge and skills gap among farmers and local workforce, limiting the operation and maintenance of hi-tech systems.

3. Credit and concessional capital inaccessibility for non-traditional farming, with complex approvals and limited awareness of schemes.

4. Infrastructure deficits in rural internet connectivity, cold chains, and reliable water/power supply.

5. Cultural and behavioural resistance to shifting from traditional methods to data-driven, precision agriculture.

6. Policy fragmentation with overlapping schemes and no unified framework for smart agriculture.

7. Data governance concerns over ownership, security, and usage of farm-level digital data.

Key Challenges being taken up

1. Pilot-scale financing mechanisms to reduce upfront cost barriers for new, small and marginal farmers.

2. Farmer training & extension programmes focused on operating hi-tech equipment and using decision-support tools.

3. Digital connectivity upgrades in target farming clusters to enable IoT and precision agriculture.

4. Demonstration of post-harvest value chains integrating cold storage, packaging, and fast logistics.

5. Integration of credit access with equipment suppliers via bank–agri-tech partnerships.

6. Water-efficient infrastructure pilots combining drip irrigation, soil moisture sensors, and renewable-powered pumps.

7. Designing local-level AgriTech policy blueprints for select states to streamline incentives and permissions.

8. Developing advanced and affordable climate controlled greenhouses

9. New and advanced variants of hydroponics

10. Business models that improve market linkages

Workshops

• Next workshop in September 2025

FOAK Impact Projects

• Community-based hydroponics facility (shared infrastructure model) producing high-value vegetables with centralised marketing.

• Drone-assisted precision farming pilot for pest control and nutrient application in a 1,000-hectare cluster.

• Solar-powered micro-irrigation with IoT controls in drought-prone districts to optimise water use.

• Village-level agri-data platform integrating soil health, weather forecasts, and market prices with farmer advisories.

• Mobile cold-storage and pack-house network linked to farmer producer organisations (FPOs) to cut post-harvest losses.

• AI-enabled crop diagnostics service using satellite and ground-based sensors for early disease detection.

• Agri-skills training hub co-located with demonstration farms to create a pipeline of trained technicians

Reference Material

• Coming soon.

Insights on Biogas

• Click here for insights on high-tech-farming

National Leads

• Dr. Vinod Tare, Founding Head, cGanga at Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur

• Mr. Sanmit Ahuja, MD and CEO, Bharatia

Important Links

• Join the High-Tech-Farming working-group and participate in the grand challenge | Click here to join

• Have a technology to introduce to India - get the solution validated via the ETV programme

• Want to contribute anything to the high-tech-farming sector development - then send us the suggestion via the working group.