Hyderabad: State Agriculture Minister Tummala Nageswara Rao on Friday said Telangana agricultural technology received international recognition at the AI Impact Summit held at Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi.
He said the acknowledgement reflected the state’s progress in building digital infrastructure for farmers. The high-level summit was jointly organised by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) and Germany’s Fraunhofer Heinrich Hertz Institute (HHI). Global experts, scientists and policymakers attended the event.
The meeting focused on standards and policy pathways to scale AI-enabled, farmer-centric agrifood systems. Participants discussed governance frameworks and the use of standards to expand digital agriculture. They also flagged challenges such as multiple farmer identification systems, inconsistent land records and fragmented advisory services. Therefore, experts stressed the need for a comprehensive, standards-based Digital Farm Infrastructure.
Telangana agricultural technology highlighted through ACRAT project
During the summit, speakers referred to the ACRAT project, or Accelerating Climate-Resilient Agriculture in Telangana. The initiative is being implemented by Fraunhofer HHI, Professor Jayashankar Telangana Agricultural University, AgHub Foundation and the Telangana government. It integrates farmer registries, land records, crop data, advisory services and market interfaces into a single digital platform.
The Minister said Telangana agricultural technology had positioned the state as a pioneer in seamless digital farming aligned with global standards. He added that international experts, including the German Agricultural Counselor, appreciated the model.
Tummala Nageswara Rao said the government had introduced several technology-driven reforms under Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy. These include a mobile urea booking app to ensure transparent fertiliser distribution and curb black marketing. In addition, the state uses satellite mapping, soil analysis, IoT sensors, crop forecasting and weather-based advisories.
He further stated that a pilot programme has been launched to identify soil nutrients using satellite data and AI modelling. The system will soon expand across Telangana to provide accurate soil analysis and scientific crop guidance. He said the Telangana agricultural technology model could guide both the country and the world.