Center announced the creation of FIAT, will help in assessing crop damage and claim settlement

The Central Government has announced the creation of a separate fund for innovation and technology, FIAT, of Rs 824.77 crore for incentivizing technology in the implementation of crop insurance schemes. This will be helpful in using technology for fast assessment of crop damage, claim settlement, and fewer disputes. It will also help in using digital technologies for easy registration and more coverage.

The Ministry of Agriculture in a statement said, "The fund would be utilized for financing the technological initiatives under the scheme such as Yes-Tech, WINDS, etc. and research and development studies." Yield Estimation System using Technology (YES-TECH) adopts remote sensing technology for yield estimation, with minimum 30 percent weightage given to technology-based yield estimates.

The ministry said that automatic weather stations (AWS) are being installed at the block level and automatic rain gauges (ARGs) at the panchayat level under the Weather Information and Network Data System (WINDS). There is a talk of increasing the current network density by five times to develop hyper-local weather data under WINDS. Under this initiative, only the data rental cost is paid by the central and state governments.

Union Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said that the Cabinet has also approved the export of 10 lakh tonnes of non-basmati rice to Indonesia through National Cooperative Export Limited (NCEL). This export will be done under a Memorandum of Understanding between NCEL, the Ministry of Cooperation, and the Indonesian Government.