AgriBot

India is an agricultural country, with agriculture employing the majority of the population. Pesticides are broadly and indiscriminately used in agricultural production, posing a serious threat to both the environment and public health. We observed that more than 77% farmers were aware of the adverse health effects of the pesticides, but because they were not able to afford the cost of pesticide spraying machines they were forced to use these pesticides sprayer themselves. 

They do not follow safety practices regarding pesticide application and due to this 70% of them reported at least one symptom of acute pesticide poisoning. Headaches (54.54%), runny nose (45.45), coughing (44.54%), watery eyes (43.63) were the most common symptoms followed by itchy eyes/irritation (31.81%), skin irritation (30%), fatigue (29.09%), nausea (18.18%), and dizziness (7.27%).

Despite of knowing hazardous effects of pesticides on their heath, farmers do it for the protection of crops, on the cost of their own safety.

Almost 50 per cent of India's total population consists of small farmers and their families. Because they cannot afford to spend millions on a machine or drone to spray pesticide, they are compelled to employ these pesticide spraying tanks. A farmer may experience health problems if pesticide drops accidentally fall on his body when he is applying them.

A prime illustration of this can be find here.

AgriBot is a highly affordable robot that can be used by small farmers for spraying pesticides. This robot can be controlled by phone via Bluetooth and it was designed keeping in mind the current state of the farm. Our robot can carry 17l of pesticide which is a very big advantage against pesticide spraying drones which can carry only 8l-10l of pesticide. 

A typical pesticide spraying drone costs about 1lakh rupees whereas our robot will cost only 12000-15000 rupees making it highly affordable for all.

The wheels of this robot are kept less thick so that it wouldn't affect the crops. 

Our target population is small farmers who can't afford to pay lakhs for machines and drones to spray pesticides. We want to serve 50%of Indian farmers who are small farmers and are looking for nice affordable alternatives. Through this robot, we hope to change the farming method of small scale farmers and want to empower them with the current technology.

I'm taking part in this contest individually. I'm a ninth-grader from DELHI, India. I am also a member of the CBSE and INTEL-created AI Students Committee. I'm interested in technology, and I want to create something that can significantly improve society and provide a solution to millions of problems. I am among those who focus more on the problem than on the solution. Future plans include starting my own business to produce tech-related goods that can be used to solve a variety of everyday issues. I'm quite interested in programming, and I'm familiar with C, PYTHON, HTML, JAVA, JAVASCRIPT, and MYSQL. In a nutshell, I love technology.

I have taken the advice of many farmers who have faced this issue and then I made my final solution design so that it won't have any negative affect.

In my earlier design the crop was getting affected by the robot's wheel when it was moving and many farmers complained about this. Based on their feedback I made changes to it and made its wheel less thick so that it wouldn't affect the crops and it would be same as when farmers move on their farm.

This test was conducted on a 100acres farm in Deoria, Uttar Pradesh. It took almost  2hours to spray out the whole farm.

I need funds to develop my prototype and also someone who could really help me in building my final product. Right now I am able to take only some people's advice but under the right guidance, I think that I can really understand the problem more perfectly and build a nice solution. 

Right now I am an 8th grader and I don't have any registered organization to build a final product but I know that through Solve I would get a chance to get in contact with mentors and professionals who can really guide me in making this product.

I don't have the right guidance and financial support but if I am selected as a finalist then I will surely convert this prototype into a solution because I know it is going to help make millions of people's life better.

In short, I am participating in this competition to get the right guidance and financial support.