Government of Kerala, Kerala State IT Mission, the nodal Agency to Department of Electronics and Information Technology in association with CISCO & Mindtree is equipping with a technology driven Agriculture project initiative, called Village Knowledge Center –VKC, to empower the farmers in the state, improve agricultural productivity and business enablement opportunities for farmers, thereby achieve the goal of accelerating the rural economy. As a pilot project, a group of 15 panchayats in Kannur districts has been selected to roll out the VKC project mostly from two constituencies in Kannur district- Dharmadam &Taliparambu.
As part of the pilot implementation of Smart Village Project - A Training Program on Village Knowledge Center was conducted by Kerala State IT Mission on 21st & 22nd February at NIT Calicut Campus for a group of farmers from 15 Grama Panchayats in Kannur district. Shri.James Mathew MLA from Taliparamba constituency inagurated the training program. Shri. Sivasankar IAS, Principal Secretary, E & IT Department has done the key note address. Dr. Saji Gopinath, Director IIITM-K & Kerala Startup Mission also addressed the audience. Local self-government representatives also participated in the training program. Shri.Sarad Thikkal, Technology Expert from KSITM coordinated the whole event.
The Information Technology Policy 2017 of Government of Kerala envisions transformation of Kerala as a Knowledge Powered Digital Society by 2020 through application of Digital Technologies in areas of Digital Citizenship, Digital Lifestyle and Digital commerce. A key objective of the policy is to improve lives of common people by leveraging the power of technology. With a vision to develop an inclusive society, Government has started “Smart Village” project to adopt Digital Technologies to improve livelihood, commerce and lifestyle in rural areas through judicious deployment of digital technologies. A key element of Smart Village project is the establishment of Village Knowledge Centers (VKCs). VKCs are conceptualized as institutions at the panchayats level which will act as nodal centers to bridge information asymmetry in the rural economy, providing thrust to sectors like agriculture, health, education etc. which are crucial in improving lives of people living in the area. A spectrum of digital technologies ranging from smart sensors to geospatial analytical solutions are being planned to be deployed under each VKC depending upon the focal theme of the VKCs