International Conference on Innovative Agricultural
Financing
April 28-29, 2015 at Hotel Serena, Islamabad
Day 1 – Tuesday 28 April 2015
Session B: Digital platforms in building data-ecosystem for agri-finance
Crop Information Portal
Agriculture Information System
Building Provincial Capacity for Crop Forecasting and Estimation
Mr. Muhammad Iftikhar Bhatti
General Manager (RS & GIS), SUPARCO
Background
• The Crop Information Portal is a
component of the Agriculture
Information System (AIS) of Pakistan.
• The AIS project concerns the
improvement of the capacity of
provincial governments to timely
collect, analyze and report on
agricultural information.
• The Portal allows WEB users to access
the historical archive and the latest
produced crop and agrometeorological data, integrated with
satellite based information into a GIS
like environment.
http://dwms.fao.org/~test/
Factsheet
• Major crops currently included are:
 wheat (RABI)
 maize, sugarcane, rice and cotton (KHARIF)
• Crop data: area, production, yield (annual)
• Agro-met indicators: 10 day averages for max
and min temp, precipitations, daylight length
and NDVI
• Spatial resolution: district, province and
country
• Temporal extent: 1999-current date
• Outputs: maps, charts, tables, reports
Factsheet
• Implemented by FAO, SUPARCO
and USDA
• Based on open source
technologies and international
geospatial standards
• Web graphical interface for
generic users interaction
• Web graphical interface (login)
for administrators managing
data and running processes
• Currently, one national instance
at SUPARCO and 2 provincial
instances at Lahore (CRS
Punjab) and Karachi (CRS Sindh)
Portal Main User Interface
Portal modules
• Crop Data Explorer: set filters, area of
interest and time period and produce
outputs such as tables, charts and
choropleth maps
• Agro-Meteorological Data Explorer:
set filters to extract statistics on
variables such as temperature,
precipitation, decadal NDVI, etc..) as
data or charts
• Crop Health Status: agromet variables
compared to the requirements of a
selected crop in a selected growing
season
• Map Composer: WEB mapping
application based on International
standards allowing local or remote
datasets to be displayed and analyzed
in a GIS like environment
Example of use
• Task: chart annual trend of wheat data in 3 districts of Punjab
Crop data can be retrieved and analyzed using the
graphic interface on the left. The system allows
users to:
Select output type
• Generate time-series charts (Chart)
Filter available crops by season (Rabi)
Select area of interest
Type: Group of District (from list or by clicking
on map)
Identify crop of interest (wheat)
Select time interval for the averaging (2000-2012)
Select Units of Measure (default)
RESULTS
Example of use
• Task: chart annual trend of wheat data in 3 districts of Punjab
Examples of Outputs
Main Benefits
• One shop access to historical data on annual crop
production, harvested area and yield and
seasonal trend of agro-met variables
– Harmonization of data currently scattered at national
and local institutions, in various formats and units
• Improvement in data management
– Standardization, minor effort in data merging and
reduction of errors
• Improvement in data access
– Ability to easily generate customized charts, maps and
reports based on subsets of data stored in primary DB
• Improvement in CRS’s regular crop reporting
– Custom charts and maps can be generated and extracted
for a rapid enrichment of monthly bulletins with ancillary
data
Training Workshop on Crop Information Portal and
GeoNetwork software. 20-31 Jan 2014.
FAO and SUPARCO
organized a two week
training workshop in
Islamabad:
•
•
•
Jan 20-23: Administrating the Crop
Information Portal
Jan 24-27: Using the Crop
Information Portal
Jan 28-31: GeoNetwork
opensource software
Nineteen experts from Crop Reporting Services of Punjab, Sindh, Khyber
Pakhtunkhwa and Baluchistan; from the Agriculture Universities of Tandojam
and Faisalabad and from SUPARCO
11
Up coming Updates
•
•
Based on user feedback, collected during trainings and workshops the portal is
being enhanced to incorporate the following dataset and functionalities
Main groups of updates are:
– Filtering: Scalable charting and user defined data seasonal limits for
Agromet/NDVI data.
– Data: Include data on fertilizers, irrigation water and market prices; also, include
alternative crop data estimates.
– Charting: Compare alternative areas or crops in one chart; the choice of
different chart types (lines, bars, pies etc..); the choice of user defined units of
measure (e.g. acres for areas), and more.
These updates will be implemented by the end September 2015. Such
development is currently on going.
• The next slides summarize some of the most exciting updates
• The finalization of this second version of the Portal is
estimated for the end of May 2015.
Alternative Chart Types
• Combinat
ion of
types and
rendering
• Comparis
on of
different
areas for
a
selected
crop
• Stacking
data
Alternative Chart Types
• Combinat
ion of
types and
rendering
• Comparis
on of
different
areas for
a
selected
crop
• Stacking
data
Alternative Chart Types
• Combinat
ion of
types and
rendering
• Comparis
on of
different
areas for
a
selected
crop
• Stacking
data
Combined Agro-met Variables
• Combined chart on 12 months
time range
Improved Mapping
map of 2010 harvested area with rice
• Map
selected
year
• Map
Average
selected
period
• Map
Anomali
es
Improved Mapping
• Map
selected
year
• Map
Average
selected
period
• Map
Anomalies
map of 2008-2012 average production for wheat
Improved Mapping
map of 2012 minus average 1999-2012 area for sugarcane
• Map
selected
year
• Map
Average
selected
period
• Map
Anomalies
Improved data content
• Fertilizers
consumption
• Water
discharge
• Market prices
• Additional
sources of
crop data
Annual summaries per province (*)
(*) Currently, the database is empty except for few records used to test
Improved data content
• Fertilizers
consumption
• Water
discharge
• Market
prices
• Additional
sources of
crop data
Monthly data per District (*)
(*) Currently, the database is empty except for few records used to test (only Nitrogen, 5 months in
2011)
Improved data content
• Fertilizers
consumption
• Water
discharge
• Market prices
• Additional
sources of
crop data
Modules under construction as we speak
Crop Information Portal
Agriculture Information System
Building Provincial Capacity for Crop Forecasting and Estimation
Thank you
Mr. Muhammad Iftikhar Bhatti
General Manager (RS & GIS), SUPARCO