TRAI chief says 5G will help in precision farming

According to Dr. P D Vaghela, Chairman of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), states with strong telecom infrastructure will attract more investments and create jobs, resulting in a stronger economy.

"State governments must strive to have the best and latest telecom technology in their State, such as 5G, IoT, AI, Augmented Reality, Virtual Reality, and many other areas, for the implementation of industrial automation (industry 4.0), precision agriculture, smart education, automation in healthcare, and many other areas," he said.

On Wednesday, he spoke about the introduction to 5G and key performance indicators, use cases of 5G, the role of State governments, the growth of telecom in India, and government initiatives in broadband and telecom reforms at the Administrative Staff College of India's (ASCI) online public lecture titled '5G: A Next-Generation Technology.'

Sensor networks, precision farming, smart irrigation, climate change mitigation, livestock monitoring, and agricultural drones, he claimed, would all benefit from 5G in agriculture.

He added that, in addition to being advantageous in smart mining through real-time condition monitoring, 5G technology is capable of providing the necessary bandwidth for students and institutions in the sphere of online education and learning, which requires high-speed data access.

It also enhances video surveillance and analytics, solid waste management, and intelligent parking in smart cities, and that the technology would create an immersive experience in video streaming, gaming, and sports, where user/machine-generated content from smart devices could help users share data in real-time, improving the user experience.

Vaghela discussed the use of satellite-based communication in the North-Eastern States and how it was beneficial in remote hills and rural areas.

He noted that the BharatNet initiative has the potential to transform the situation and that the previous six years have seen a revolution in rural areas in terms of telecom and digital service growth.

5G will help in the distribution of energy inside a smart grid and smart meters in the energy and power grid industry.

It would improve traffic management, vehicle and school bus tracking, and over-speeding monitoring in the automobile industry as well.