International Webinar on “Soil Spectroscopy” jointly organized by ICAR-IISS, Bhopal and ICRAF, Nairobi

1^st October, 2020, Bhopal

The ICAR-Indian Institute of Soil Science, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh and the World Agroforestry (ICRAF), Nairobi, Kenya jointly organized an International Webinar on “Soil Spectroscopy: An Emerging Technique for Rapid Soil Health Assessment” today.

In his inaugural address, Dr. Trilochan Mohapatra, Secretary (DARE) & DG (ICAR) emphasized on the state of the art of “Soil Spectroscopy” and its potential application as an alternative to the traditional laboratory analyses. Dr. Mohapatra suggested for creating a standard for the collection of laboratory soil spectra to promote the sharing of spectral libraries across the countries.

Dr. Tony Simons, Director General, World Agroforestry (ICRAF), Nairobi, Kenya emphasized on creating the local and regional partnerships to generate the necessary technical competence on use of soil spectroscopy for land degradation surveillance on a landscape scale.

Dr. S.K. Chaudhari, Deputy Director General (Natural Resource Management), ICAR stressed on the rapid development of portable and handheld spectrometers for the development of monitoring networks across the country for swiftly and efficiently assessing the state of the soil resources at minimal costs.

Dr. Ravi Prabhu, Deputy Director General (Research), ICRAF, Nairobi and Dr. Javed Rizvi, Director, South Asia Program, ICRAF, New Delhi highlighted the use of soil spectroscopy for soil mapping and enumeration of soil health.

Dr. Ashok K. Patra, Director, ICAR-Indian Institute of Soil Science, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh highlighted the major research achievements of ICAR-IISS-ICRAF collaborative project on “Soil Spectroscopy”.

The eminent speakers shared their research experiences from Australia, Africa, U.K. and India during the Webinar.

The Webinar was organized in the pursuit of developing the fast, cost-effective, environment-friendly, non-destructive, reproducible and repeatable analytical technique for soil characterization / assessment which will be helpful in achieving the Government Schemes, such as, Soil Health Cards.

Around 850 participants representing 28 countries from scientific, educational and private & public research institutions across the globe attended the Webinar.

(Source: ICAR-Indian Institute of Soil Science, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh)