India and US discussed the sharing of global best practices on agriculture-extension reforms, among other measures, to boost productivity at the sidelines of the World Food India conference.

The talks were co-chaired by Ramesh Chand, Member, NITI Aayog, and Ted McKinney, United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) new Under Secretary for Trade and Foreign Agricultural Affairs, who is on his first visit to India in this new role.

A statement from the US-India Strategic Partnership Forum said that leveraging agri-tech for last-mile development, and creating a conducive ecosystem to fund innovation in agri business, were also discussed.

Mukesh Aghi, President, USISPF, said: “Indian agriculture has come a long way from its earlier image of being traditional, subsistence and non-commercial. With increasing demand for high-quality and value-added products, agriculture has been adopting commercially and economically viable agri business solutions.”