Digital Green India has announced that its AI-powered agricultural advisory platform, FarmerChat, has crossed 10 lakh users in India since its launch in October 2024. The milestone includes both farmers and frontline extension workers and coincides with the launch of FarmerChat 2.0, an upgraded version designed to deliver more personalised and hyperlocal farming advice.
Available in five Indian languages, FarmerChat enables users to seek guidance through voice, text or images, making it accessible even to farmers with low literacy levels and those in low-connectivity regions. The platform provides recommendations on crop planning, pest and disease management, livestock care, weather forecasts and farm inputs.
Since its launch, FarmerChat has responded to over 30 lakh farmer queries, with women accounting for around 45% of its users. According to an independent assessment by 60 Decibels, around 60% of active users have acted on the advice received, while 91% reported greater confidence in making farming decisions.
Farmer-led redesign
Digital Green said FarmerChat 2.0 has been redesigned based on farmer feedback. Users increasingly preferred speaking to the AI assistant or uploading photographs of crop issues instead of typing queries. The upgraded platform now offers a simpler interface, personalised advisory cards and proactive prompts tailored to a farmer’s crop, location and stage of cultivation.
The platform is powered by fine-tuned language models combined with Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) and expert-validated agricultural datasets. Responses are regularly reviewed by local agronomists and veterinarians to ensure the advice remains accurate, locally relevant and practical.
Lowering the cost of agricultural extension
Digital Green said FarmerChat has significantly reduced the cost of delivering agricultural advisory services. While traditional extension services cost around ₹3,300 per farmer annually, the AI-powered platform has brought this down to approximately ₹33 per farmer per year, making quality advisory services more scalable and affordable.
The organisation said FarmerChat builds on its 15-year legacy of delivering farmer-made video advisories, combining trusted agricultural knowledge with AI to offer on-demand, personalised support.
Digital Green India CEO Nidhi Bhasin said the latest version was shaped directly by farmer feedback.
“Everything in FarmerChat 2.0 came from listening to farmers. Through millions of interactions, they shared that they wanted advice suited to their crop, their season and their language, delivered the way they naturally communicate,” she said.
Looking ahead, Digital Green aims to onboard another 35 lakh farmers by 2028, with a focus on increasing women’s participation, promoting climate-smart farming practices and improving rural household incomes.