Amul to use remote sensing to estimate fodder production

Vadodara/ Anand: The first ever remote sensing centre for estimation of fodder crops in Anand and Kheda districts was inaugurated at Amul Dairy campus in milk city Anand on Saturday.
Last year the Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF) – the apex body of all the district dairy unions of Gujarat — had signed a MoU with the Space Application Centre (SAC) of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) for this project.

The Amul Remote Sensing Center which inaugurated in presence of Tapan Misra, director, SAC, ISRO in presence of GCMMF’s chairman Ramsinh Parmar, GCMMF’s managing director R S Sodhi and Amul Dairy’s managing director Dr K Rathnam will work towards estimation of fodder crops in Kheda, Anand and Mahisagar districts.

Similar centre will also come up at Banas Dairy for Banaskantha and Patan districts of North Gujarat.

“This is an innovative idea to help milk producers to help them to know when to initiate cultivation of fodder crop by use of satellite images. This would help farmers to estimate fodder production, plan them to grow or intensify fodder production and improve fodder availability leading to increase in milk production and economic benefit,” said an official.

“This will pave a new era of fodder crop management using satellite data for current status of fodder crops grown during one crop cycle like rabi, kharif and summer in a year,” the official said.

The fodder crop estimation will also act as a decision making tool for monitoring national level projects like the Accelerated Fodder Development Program, National Livestock Mission, phase one of the National Dairy Plan and other watershed projects.

“It can be utilized in dairy sector for decision support in drought management also. Gradually it will be scaled up to all districts of Gujarat through respective milk unions of GCMMF,” the official said.