Everyone had heard about agricultural drones coming soon, but we at Syngenta brought them. This increased the excitement of growers and the regional authorities alike. At every demonstration we are conducting, the local government authorities have made it a point to attend the events. It was a similar event today as well.Welcome to Day 4 in Rajasthan as we cover Ajmer and Tonk today with a fresh new outlook as we cover an interesting flavor of crops today. We are taking a different route from the regular paddy and groundnut, and spraying on Cauliflower and Black Gram. This was not only an interesting demonstration, but also an opportunity for our field team to gather some data about how the drone would perform on such crops. This information comes handy when the field team interacts with farmers in the region.We started the day in Ajmer in a Cauliflower farm. We had a good gathering of farmers to watch the drone in action. Our dealership network were also present to see the new initiatives Syngenta is…

The agri-science community in India is very active, and they do not leave a chance to explore anything new and interesting in the world of agricultural technology. In the recent times, the buzz around drone technologies in India is rising substantially, aided by the big announcement by our Hon. Prime Minister Narendra Modi to allow technology aided farming via drones. The government has further announced subsidies for farming institutions, farming processing companies and more which has resulted in a lot of traction for drones in farming.During our Drone Yatra, we visited multiple agricultural institutions in Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, doing demonstrations for students who are the future of agriculture in the country. This also brought a lot of scientists to the demonstrations who wanted to see the drone in action and understand its functioning from a scientific point of view about how it is effective in comparison to a regular sprayer.Something similar happened today. Welcome to Day 3 in Rajasthan, we…

When we do something for the betterment of the farmer, and the government body decides to step up in support, is always a good sight for any organization. This what we experienced in our visit to Khanpur for the demonstrations. Welcome to Day 2 of Rajasthan, where we will be covering Bhilwara, Khanpur and Anta, with a very special attendee in Khanpur.Our journey began in Bhilwara where we arrived at our first location for the demonstration. It was a groundnut farm of one of the lead Syngenta farmers. We are always glad and thankful of our lead farmers who come forward in support of the latest technologies to be demonstrated. We started out with our briefing and the demonstration, post which we had a quick Q&A tackling the basic questions of farmers and then moved out to the second location, Khanpur.Upon reaching Khanpur, we got a unexpected surprise. The news of us conducting drone demonstrations had reached the Chairman of the local dam in the region, and he decided on being present at the location…

Our Syngenta Drone Yatra has finally arrived in Rajasthan. We have traversed through three states to reach here and we have made it. Welcome to Pratapgarh and Day 1 of the Drone Yatra in Rajasthan. The state of Rajasthan is home to India’s largest desert, the Thar desert. But, its main attractions are the various palaces and forts since Rajasthan used to be the place of many royalties in India’s past, from which it derives its name which translates to ‘King’s Land’. It is also home to many tigers which live in the Ranthambore National Park.In terms of agriculture, even though the total arable land in Rajasthan is less owing to the vast desert, it is still a significant contributor to India’s agricultural GDP. Its major crops include grains such as Bajra and Jowar, Maize, pulses, and more as well as cash crops like Cotton and a little Sugarcane. It also grows a lot of vegetables too. The farms we chose for demonstrations mostly included groundnut since it is a widely grown crop in the region, as well as it is…

Welcome to Day 3 in Gujarat for our Syngenta Drone Yatra. We are officially on Day 19 of our demonstrations. It has been a long journey till now, but we are just getting started. Today, our journey will be taking us to Idar, Himatnagar, and Revas in Gujarat after which we finish the Gujarat leg and move towards Rajasthan.We began our day with the first demonstration in Idar. A good turnout of farmers were present for the demonstration to witness the drone in action on a groundnut field. After the demonstration, one of the lead farmers made a very interesting point. Groundnuts being such a crop that grows below ground, when they move in the field to spray during rains, the crop is at risk to be trampled, and the trampled crop does not give any output. Using drones, the risk of loss of crops can be eliminated.Post completion of the event we moved to the next location in Himatnagar. Himatnagar also had a substantial farmer turnout where we did the usual brief and demonstration. The farmers here were very…

Welcome to Day 2 in Gujarat of our Drone Yatra. Today our journey will be covering three demonstrations, Bharuch, Vadodara and Anand. This is a major paddy belt, hence, all the demonstrations took place on paddy field. It was a good thing because considering the numerous challenges there are to spray on paddy, demonstrating on the crop was beneficial for the farmers to witness it live.Our journey began in Bharuch where we arrived to a wonderful welcome, followed by a quick briefing of the drone, its technical specifications and how it can help ease the efforts of the farmers. We then moved to the field for a demo where we sprayed the paddy field with water to showcase how the drone works and its overall coverage of the entire crop. The farmers were very impressed with the demonstration and were eager to know about the launch of commercial operations.We then moved to the next location near Vadodara. Vadodara was an amazing experience for us since a lot of farmers, as well as our local retailer and distributor…

Our Drone Yatra journey in Madhya Pradesh was an exciting one with a perfect end to the leg, made special by the presence of Hon. Min. Kamal Patel. Filled with excitement and energy, we made our way to the state of Gujarat. Renowned for being the birthplace of the Iron Man of India Sardar Vallabh bhai Patel and our current Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi, Gujarat is a state known for its amazing food. Famous dishes such as Undiyo, Fafda, and more, as well as the famous Rann of Kutch, you can find it all here.Gujarat also has a significant contribution to India’s agriculture. Majorly grown crops include grains such as Millet, Paddy, Bajra and Maize. Other crops include Cotton, Groundnut and Sugarcane. It is also one of the major markets for Syngenta India. This made the journey to Gujarat even more interesting because we knew a large turnout is a guarantee.We began our first demonstration in Gujarat in a village near Surat. It was a paddy field. Almost 100 farmers were already present at the demonstration…

When we set out for the Drone Yatra, we had hoped to create a buzz among the farmer community to take notice of our efforts of educating the masses about the advantages of using drones to spray in the farm. We had definitely not anticipated to attract such large audiences and moreover, attention of the governing authorities. Welcome to Day 5 in Madhya Pradesh when we received a call from the Farmer Welfare and Agriculture Development Office, saying that Minister Kamal Patel wanted to attend the drone demonstration in person.It definitely did not happen within 24 hours; we had a couple of days’ notice that he was going to attend in Baranga, but we needed to kick into action swiftly to arrange for a grand event. It is truly a feat by Syngenta’s field team to get all the logistics and arrangements in place for the event and in time. We had booked an entire day for just the one event because it was expected to be a major event, and it sure was.Since an hour to the event time, the crowd had started gathering…

It is never ideal when things run a bit delayed and someone has to wait for you. It is just a bonus that even after the wait, we were able to make the people present happy. Welcome to Day 4 of the Madhya Pradesh leg of the Drone Yatra. It is officially 15 days that we have been on the road doing demonstrations starting from Maharashtra and now in Madhya Pradesh. Today’s visits are Kalukhedi, Akolia, Khategaon.We have noticed in our journey’s till date, the morning session is always the calmest, since everyone has had the time to setup and rest, prepared to take the day head on. It is always the second or the third session which is challenging at times for myriad reasons. Which means, the first visit to Kalukhedi went by without a hitch. We reached the destination on time, the demonstration was conducted on time, and we then moved towards our next destination.We reached our next destination Akolia, set up and conducted a successful demonstration. Everything went by perfectly, and then we began our farmer…

It is always a great feeling when with every visit you do, something special happens or occurs. Today was something similar. We visited Semlia Nasar, Sirolia and Vijayganj Mandi on our Drone Yatra’s tour to Madhya Pradesh; Welcome to day 3 in Madhya Pradesh.We generally ensure that our demonstration is attended by the nearest retailer and distributers since they have been our partners in India for a long time. Some of our network operators have had a major impact to Syngenta’s presence and brand value in India. Many a times, they are unable to attend owing to numerous reasons, seasonal buying being in full swing is a major one. Luckily, one of our visits today was near the Mandi, which meant the retailers and distributors and a lot of other farmers were present for the event since it was a quick travel.Our journey began in Semlia Nasar in the morning, followed by Sirolia in the afternoon. As expected, there was a good turnout, since by now the news of Drone Yatra had reached far and wide, and everyone was…

Welcome to Madhya Pradesh, Day 2. Today we covered Banedia, Barlai and Nagpur, covering more Soya Bean farms. We happened to be going on a day when a local festival is celebrated which made us wonder if as many farmers might attend the event. Gladly, we were wrong. The turnout was very strong as we conducted successful demonstrations at every location. Overall up to 200 farmers witnessed the demonstrations across all locations.We reached our first location of the day, Banedia. A Soya bean farm was awaiting us with a substantial crowd of farmers. Our Yatra truck had reached the location beforehand to set up and that brought in a lot of farmers who were curious to see what it was all about. Once we reached, the demonstration began which pulled more crowds. The farmers were a lot interested to understand how the drones would help. Some farmers complained that they have electrical poles running through their fields, and in that case, if they will be able to avail the services.Our drone pilot helped put them to…

After a super successful Drone Yatra journey in Maharashtra, we moved to the beautiful Madhya Pradesh. It is majorly famous for its amazing street food, super nice people, and one of India’s major Tiger reserves. Apart from all this, it is also a major state for India in terms of Soya bean and Wheat production. One of India’s most popular and highest quality wheat produce comes from Madhya Pradesh.We travelled from Dhule in Maharashtra where we concluded our final demonstration and travelled to Madhya Pradesh, starting our demos in the village of Jotpur, moving towards Balipur and Dhamnod. We were sure that the participation in Madhya Pradesh was going to be amazing, but the actual results were surprisingly overwhelming. The Sarpanch (leader) of the Jotpur was also present to witness the demonstration. This helped build Syngenta’s brand and service provider assurance in the minds of the farmers.After our first successful demonstration in Jotpur, we moved to Balipur. Balipur was a great experience and some of…