UNDP India partners with NABARD to boost data-driven innovations in agriculture

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to co-create data-driven innovations in agriculture and food systems to support smallholder farmers. Under this MoU, both organizations will work to improve the lives and livelihoods of smallholder farmers by sharing open-source data for product development, transfer of technology and supporting the framing of agrarian policies.

The MoU was signed by Chief General Manager of NABARD, Mr. Sanjeev Rohilla, and UNDP Deputy Resident Representative, Ms. Isabelle Tschan. Under the MoU, UNDP will leverage its expertise in open innovations, data collaboratives, data science approaches and global know-how for supporting NABARD’s agenda of embedding data-driven decision-making in agriculture investments.

The partnership includes enhancing and disseminating collaborative digital public goods like DiCRA (Data in Climate Resilient Agriculture). DiCRA is a collaborative digital public good which provides open access to key geospatial datasets pertinent to climate resilient agriculture. DiCRA, which is curated by UNDP and partner organizations to inform public investments in agriculture, already provides intelligence on climate resilience for 50 million hectares of farmland across India. By partnering for enhancing and scaling its use, NABARD will host and maintain the DiCRA platform and use its key geospatial datasets for policy making, research and development activities, with UNDP’s technical support.

This five-year technical cooperation is envisaged to foster collective climate action, create innovative platforms and new product offerings to enhance economic empowerment in rural India.

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