Food security

New Delhi: Geospatial mapping is a buzzword today with the Govt. of India liberalizing the sector. There is another side of mapping that could transform the food security program of India; soil maps, which could be accessed using differential GPS (DGPS), developed by researchers at (Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur) IIT, Kharagpur for a variable rate of fertilization application in farmlands. Spatial variations in soil type and mineral content in large agricultural tracts are a common phenomenon that leads to a dynamic need for resources such as fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides and even water. Farmers have been collecting information on these…