eSAP

eSAP is an ICT tool for plant protection. A person needs (1) a minimum Diploma in Agriculture or allied subjects, and (2) to qualify a test, for logging in to eSAP. eSAP is not available for everyone. The Govt. of Karnataka, in its efforts to digitalise agricultural extension, has adopted eSAP to empower qualified extension workers to provide plant protection services. Content support, expert support, training support and deployment of eSAP in Karnataka is managed by the University of Agricultural Sciences, Raichur in collaboration with other Agricultural Universities in the State. How can one log-in to eSAP? Persons with the essential qualifications shall first install the PesTesT app from the PlayStore. The videos on PesTesT help users in describing the symptoms expressed by the damaged plants, and ascribing the cause of the damage to one of the six problem groups — insects/mites, fungi, bacteria, viruses, nematodes, and nutritional disorders. The persons can then contact their respective District Agricultural Training Centres (DATCs), who shall verify their records and give the test. Persons who pass the test are provided with a digital certificate. Later, the DATC allows users to train themselves on using the eSAP app, before assigning them the rights to provide services to the farmers. Field User Application of eSAP: This application enables extension workers to register farmers, identify crop health problems, estimate the extent of the problems, prescribe solutions, and follow-up with the farmers. The extension workers can diagnose and manage insect pests, microbial diseases, and nutritional disorders that affect crop health. eSAP follows a dichotomously branching design for diagnosis. The design is built over a universalised set of symptoms that is unique to eSAP. The design allows for an unbiased diagnosis of any and all crop health problems by the extension workers in the farmers fields. Expert Support System: In a situation where an extension worker needs help during the diagnosis, eSAP connects the worker with the designated team of State Experts. eSAP is paired with eSAP Expert App, a separate mobile app for experts. eSAP Expert is integrated with a discussion forum and an auto-escalation to flag delayed responses.The response from the experts are relayed to the farmers by the relevant extension worker. Principles of Integrated Pest Management (IPM): The field user app has crop/crop age/problem-specific protocols for damage assessment. Economic Threshold Levels (ETLs) defined in the system position the crop health problem according to the damage intensity. Based on the age of the crop, nature of the problem and the intensity of the damage, prescriptions are generated in the device. Other features of the field user application: -The application works offline in Kannada and English languages. -eSAP allows the extension workers from different organisations in the State to work on a common instance. -Farmer list is synchronised across devices and is made available when offline too. Thus, extension workers do not depend on network availability to identify previously registered farmers, which helps in tracking the crop health situations prevailing in each farm, and in each crop. Web portal of eSAP: The portal side of eSAP allows the client to create multiple accounts and sub-accounts, with each account defined by a unique set of properties — crops, prescriptions, locations, languages, devices, experts and report users. Role-based access ensures smooth functioning of the system. The Reporting Engine of eSAP allows users to generate a variety of reports — tables, graphs and spatial plots. Farm-specific history can also be accessed through the reporting system. eSAP is built on Sativus, the Crop Health Management Platform of M/s. Tene Agricultural Solutions Pvt. Ltd., Bengaluru for UAS Raichur.