NEW DELHI, 21 Jan: The state government is looking to take a lead role in promoting drone technology in the Northeast region and will soon be conducting pilot projects for healthcare and afforestation using drones.
Chief Secretary Naresh Kumar on Friday reviewed the potential of drones for last-mile delivery and the roadmap to integrate these into the state’s plans, including healthcare supply chain and other applications.
“The difficult terrains of the state make it very difficult to transport critical medicines to primary and secondary health centres which are located over large distances. Drones shall play a critical role in delivering these medicines in less than half the time, thereby playing a huge role in saving lives,” Kumar said.
The state is also looking to use drone-based seed bombing for afforestation, in alignment with its vision of increasing its green cover. An area shall soon be earmarked for conducting the seed bombing pilot project.
In order to help the local youths take advantage of the newly created opportunities in the drone sector, the government is also looking to start a drone training academy in Itanagar that will focus on training and skill development.
The academy will equip the youths with competent technical skills and offer them a taste of emerging drone technologies, further creating new employment opportunities in the niche sector of drones.
The Liberalized Drone Rules, 2021 and a production-linked incentive scheme for drones were recently notified by the central government with a vision to make India a global drone hub by 2030.
The meeting was attended by the principal health secretary, the principal environment & forest secretary, the science & technology secretary and the principal of Rajiv Gandhi Government Polytechnic.
Presentations were made by three firms with expertise in application of drones. (DIPR)
