Future Farming in India A Playbook for Scaling Artificial Intelligence in Agriculture 2025

AI’s potential to tackle agriculture’s complex challenges combined with the many obstacles in deploying the technology together underscore the need for a clear and well-defined framework to develop an AI ecosystem for agriculture. This playbook intends to be the first step in supporting policy-makers in strategizing approaches to scale the use of AI in their jurisdictions. This AI for agriculture playbook has three purposes: 1. To provide an overview of potential AI use cases for agriculture that can be operationalized 2. To illustrate a structured framework on the critical pillars (enable, create and deliver) with clear actions and guidelines for stakeholders 3. To lead the way to a call for action and provide a dynamic platform to explore what’s next The playbook’s primary target audience is policy- makers, but it will help other stakeholders as well. Among them are the private-sector agribusinesses that serve farmers; agritech start-ups that develop AI-based solutions for agriculture; and development organizations designing technology programmes for farmers and extension systems. Importantly, this playbook has been carefully designed to complement the many AI-related initiatives already under way in India including IndiaAI Mission8 undertaken by MeitY (Ministry of Electronics and IT), Ministry of Agriculture’s Agri Stack9 and Vistaar10 and AI initiatives (e.g. Telangana AI Mission11 and Karnataka’s AI COEs12) and pilots set up by various state governments. Methodology To explore how AI can provide solutions for farmers’ recurring problems, a multistakeholder expert group (see Appendix 1) was constituted by the World Economic Forum under the guidance of the AI for India 2030 Advisory Council (see Appendix 2). The group used design thinking-driven research and conducted in-depth interviews with around 20 experts in India, including farmers, agronomists, agricultural technologists, policy-makers and agribusiness leaders, who offered a wide range of insightful perspectives. These interviews allowed the group to revisit the major problems that Indian farmers, particularly small farmers, face nowadays. Next, group members studied how AI could address those specific challenges, keeping in mind Indian agriculture’s unique characteristics. By grounding analysis in the first-hand experiences and well- reasoned opinions of experts, the group was able to develop a detailed, bottom-up understanding of AI’s potential to transform agriculture.The need for an AI playbook Challenges in Indian agriculture: The need for AI enablement $1,500 Average annual income of farming households in India52% Proportion of farmers in India who are in debt 30% Proportion of India’s land that is degraded10–40% Expected decrease in key crop yields in India by 2080 due to climate change This playbook intends to be the first step in supporting policy-makers in strategizing approaches to scale the use of AI in their jurisdictions. Future Farming in India 9