Digitising rural land records, one drone at a time

Wow! This is brilliant.<p>The other good news is that with Indian Government&#x27;s de-regularization of geospatial data[1] up to 1-meter resolution; the initial mapping of topographical divides can be done much faster. Start with Satellite imagery and then zoom in for finer details with drones.<p>We work with farm owners in remote corners of India, there are areas where farmlands are sandwiched between natural forest. So, some interesting problems crops up -- prevent animals from destroying farms but also help them not trap in electric (solar) fences. If cows dies, your business is pretty much dead.<p>I really hope ISRO&#x27;s data becomes easily for public access through an easy to use API, without having to navigate through their paperworks and bureaucracy. Last time I checked, some of their data (they say is for Public) comes in a downloadable that goes through a Flash Player (so, no longer works).<p>Disclosure: The link is from an article I wrote.<p>1. <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;valinor.earth&#x2F;blog&#x2F;india-geospatial-guidelines-2021&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;valinor.earth&#x2F;blog&#x2F;india-geospatial-guidelines-2021&#x2F;</a>

This made me smile:<p><i>If the project succeeds, boundaries currently defined by a tree or a stone, will stand transformed into something more tangible — a record on paper.</i>

&gt; An inadequate number of drones is another problem, as is the focus on picking the lowest bidders rather than the best technology.<p>This sounds exactly like the kind of project which shouldn&#x27;t be lowest bidder first, given the cost involved when mistakes are made.

Any thoughts on getting this right using satellite data alone instead of drones? What are the challenges?