Infocrop simulation model to forecast heatwave impact on farm yield in real time.

• Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI) conducted a first-of-its-kind experiment to quantify the impact of hot weather on crop yield in Punjab and Haryana by using InfoCrop Version 2.1.
• InfoCrop version 2.1 is India’s only dynamic crop simulation model, developed by IARI in 2015, that study the long-term impact of climate change and crop management practices on yield.
• The model has an 85 per cent accuracy rate, which is on par with widely used dynamic models such as the Decision Support System for Agrotechnology Transfer model, developed by the US, and Agriculture Production Systems sIMulator, developed by Australia.
• It has life cycle data for almost all local varieties of 11 crops: paddy, wheat, maize, sorghum, pearl millet, pigeon pea, chickpea, soybean, groundnut, potato and cotton.
• In InfoCrop, Parameters (updated at regular intervals) deal with aspects of
  1. Weather (precipitation, temperature etc.);
  2. Crop growth (grain characteristics, leaf growth etc.);
  3. Soil (water holding characteristics, pH levels etc.); and
  4. Pests and crop management (organic matter, fertiliser and irrigation).

Present scenario

• Currently, the country does not have a system to forecast crop loss due to heatwaves or most other extreme weather conditions.
  • The Mahalanobis National Crop Forecast Centre, under the Union Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, provides pre-harvest forecasts for 8 major crops at the national, state and district levels.
  • The agency also puts out forecasts accounting for drought events, but not for other extreme weather conditions.
  • The agency forecasts with static crop models, which cannot factor in real-time changes.