Sonepur: Agri Mach India, an agency that seeks to make technology accessible to farmers, is planning to launch a mobile application for the farmers of the eight districts of the state.

The app will be launched in 49 blocks of the eight districts - Sambalpur, Mayurbhanj, Balasore, Khurda, Jagatsinghpur, Nabarangpur, Koraput and Sonepur in the first phase. However, Sonepur has been chosen as the pilot district for the project.

Deputy director of agriculture in Sonepur Prashanta Satapathy said that the mobile app would go a long way in helping the farmers solve various problems that they face.

"The app will come handy in disseminating information and advice on various issues related to farming. The app will also help farmers in controlling pest attacks, getting weather forecast and purchasing agricultural products," he said.

He added that all that the farmers would have to do would be to download the app from the Google playstore on their android handsets.

Managing partner of Agri Mach India Kishore Kumar Behera said that the purpose of creating the platform was to resolve the various problems that farmers were facing.

"The farmers in Odisha are a worried lot as they face a lot of inconvenience during cultivation due to lack of information on various issues - such as how to control pest attacks, how to get weather forecast on time, how to make soil ready for farming and also how to market their products. Our platform will provide them with solutions to all their problems," Behera said.

Sumit Swarnamaya, the developer of the application, said that it was time the farmers took help of this application to manage cultivation.

"It is a very simple application and the farmers just need to have an android handset. A platform to sustain and maintain economic growth of farmers by using multipurpose machines for land preparation, transplanting, intercultural operations, harvesting and post-harvest in time," he said.

He further said that training with creating awareness among farmers on utilisation of various modern farm machinery, weather management, soil management, crop and insurance management, agriculture marketing management and updates on various government schemes would be available on the app.