NASA Technology:Secure Indian farmers from risks says-Ramakrishna Nemani

               A senior Indian earth scientist from National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Ramakrishna Nemani, hailing from Hyderabad, has modified and adapted NASA technology to secure Indian farmers from risks of climate change like floods and droughts and ensure that crop insurance reaches the deserving farmer.

                            Dubbed as Terrestrial Observation and Predicting System (TOPS), the project recently received 15 months extension, after testing it in real world conditions for the past two years on pilot basis, by the Maharashtra government. The earth scientist is also working with local authorities here to implement a similar system for Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.

                                                   The NASA researcher has brought together a system of collecting weather and climatic data through satellite remote sensing, ground weather stations, human inputs and using climatic forecasting and ecosystem models to give risk determination of crop insurance, crop assessment, sampling of crop yield, early assessment of crop loss, categorising the risk regions and more significantly forecasting the climatic conditions in such zones.

                           “The idea is to make sure that we provide flawless scientific evidence so that insurance goes to the deserving farmer who has suffered crop loss and not to a farmer who has a fully functioning borewell, but continues to claim insurance by using devious measures,” the NASA earth scientist says.

                                 The earth scientist, who visits Hyderabad and Maharashtra at least once a month from United States, is a firm believer in crop insurance as the only way to help farmers tide over climate disasters. “Climate related risk to agriculture is here to stay and insurance provides best way to mitigate it. Why can’t we bring efficiency into the system that will insure every farmer?” he asks.

                                           “In NASA, everyday we study weather patterns, droughts, rains etc of planet earth. But, it has always been my aim to apply and adapt this technology by integrating satellite and climatic data to predict the yield of crops for Indian farmers. What we have implemented is a project that uses data to make sure that the farmers are protected from severe climatic patterns like drought, floods etc by bringing efficiency in crop insurance system,” he says.

                                                                   Along with his team, the researcher has collected 30 years of climatic data in 20,000 villages of Maharashtra, current climatic conditions between 2012 and 2015, historical crop yields of bajra, wheat, soyabean and jowar in the past one decade. “We have adapted NASA models that can forecast climatic disasters for the benefit of farmers,” he said. Mr. Ramakrishna can be reached at: rnemani@niruthi.com