Cropin Launches 'Aksara' for Climate Smart Agriculture

New Delhi, Apr 16 (PTI) Agtech firm Cropin Technology on Tuesday announced the launch of 'Aksara', the sector's first purpose-built open-source micro language model for climate smart agriculture.

'Aksara' is designed to address the problems faced by the underserved farming communities in the Global South by removing barriers to knowledge, and empowering anyone in the agriculture ecosystem to build frugal and scalable artificial intelligence solutions for the sector, it said in a statement.

The first version of 'Aksara' will cover nine crops viz. paddy, wheat, maize, sorghum, barley, cotton, sugarcane, soybean, and millets for five countries in the Indian subcontinent.

Speaking on the announcement, Krishna Kumar, Founder and CEO, Cropin said in an era where Large Language Models are reshaping jobs, businesses, and customer interactions, the spotlight is now on industry-specific models trained on niche and comprehensive domain data as the 'next big thing.'

"These models can potentially transform agriculture, paving the way for a new era of tech-driven farming in a sector that has traditionally seen limited technological advancement," he said.

The domain-specific AI models for agriculture are expected to attract significant investments, offering a practical and economically viable approach to food systems transformation, he added.

This open-source initiative aims to support agronomists, agri-scientists, field staff, and extension workers and gradually extend the services to farmers in multiple languages, considering the need or local language support.

Cropin said transforming global food systems requires equipping industry think tanks and researchers with the best decision-making tools and information. This knowledge should then be disseminated at the grassroots level.