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Electronics engg society of IIT-BHU hosts Tech-Agro B-plan competition
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Monday, 04 March, 2013, 08 : 00 AM [IST]
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The second edition of Aayam – the techno-management festival of the Indian Institute of Technology-Banaras Hindu University's Electronics Engineering Society (EES IIT-BHU) – is slated to take place between April 5 and 7, 2013. It was initiated at Tech-Agro, a techno-agricultural B-plan competition, in association with the Malviya Centre for Innovation, Incubation and Entrepreneurship (MCIIE). Tech-Agro brought together experts from three of the biggest faculties of BHU – IIT-BHU, the Institute of Agriculture Sciences-BHU (IAS-BHU) and the Faculty of Management Studies-BHU (FMS-BHU).
R C Tiwari, soil scientist from IAS-BHU, was the chief guest for the event. J N Sinha and S N Upadhyay (both of whom are IIT-BHU's ex-directors) and Shivraj Singh (ex-director, IAS-BHU) were the guests of honour. P K Mishra and Pradeep Srivastava, coordinators, MCIIE, moderated the event. The chief guest and guests of honour were on the panel, which also included S P Singh, president, EES IIT-BHU; Satyabrata Jit, vice-president, EES IIT-BHU; FMS-BHU's Ashish Bajpai and Alok Kumar Rai; IAS-BHU's V K Chandolia, and progressive farmers Hari Shankar and Mahendra.
Tiwari was the keynote speaker and opened the discussion by introducing students to issues such as food security, nutritional security, food safety and the decline in the contribution of the agricultural sector to the gross domestic product (GDP) of the country. He also emphasised on the need to progress towards organic farming and to move towards a model based on sustainable technologies. Upadhyay suggested the decentralisation of inventory of readily perishable crops and provision of leasing out equipment to farmers.
Shankar stressed on the necessity of popularising technologies such as sprinklers and regulators of water pumps among farmers and pointed out problems such as lack of employment opportunities for farmers during the off-season and the unavailability of adequate facilities for soil and fertiliser testing among the many issues that are discouraging the younger generation to pursue farming. Jit identified storage of solar energy and harnessing other renewable energies as the core areas where engineering innovations could alleviate problems in the agriculture sector.
Shivraj Singh, a pioneering researcher in the field of microwave technology, focussed on the applications of high-frequency waves in detection of soil quality. Bajpai and Rai, experts in the field of management, then fine-tuned the technical solutions and shared their knowledge about how one should capitalise on these pain points and devise sustainable business solutions. They identified information gaps, coordination between farmers and business men and counselling of farmers as the major areas for improvement. Mishra appreciated the queries that the students asked the panellists and the farmers were. S P Singh proposed the vote of thanks.
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