Large tracts of arable land are left fallow due to the lack of real-time in-season and replanting site-specific information. This project aims to bridge that information gap to enable the utilization of fallow land for crop diversification, a key pillar of agriculture sustainability.

Sustainable intensification through crop diversification with pulses & vegetables in cereal systems at farmers’ fields have shown positive outcomes in terms of yield, income & nutrition, while providing important ecosystem services. However, out-scaling of such an ecological intensification program requires systemic digitization of the agroecosystems (e.g., geotagging, agrotagging) with higher resolution and timely information.

Using multi-source satellite, geo/agro tagged in-situ data, machine learning and citizen science, the project proposes to design a digital augmentation platform to characterize farming systems to scale site-specific crops/varieties in countries where fallow can be replaced by short season legumes or vegetables.

The ground-breaking innovation consists in the real-time mapping of cropping systems and their dynamics (start and end dates, length/duration of fallows, variety, typology, soil moisture) to inform site-specific interventions such as selection of the most appropriate crops and varieties in response to local conditions.