Rikin Gandhi: Fields of Dreams
Rikin Gandhi: Fields of Dreams Rikin Gandhi, 29, CEO, Digital Green An aerospace engineer from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a licenced private pilot, who was accepted to the US Air Force, he now finds himself a hero among the farmers in India. Moved to see that most of them have little access to better farming techniques, Gandhi, who is based in Delhi, decided to use his handycam as a tool for social networking. The method was simple: the farmers record their problems, solutions and success stories and the Bangalore-based Digital Green, an NGO headed by Gandhi, ensures these videos reach those who need them most. Although video has been tried many times in agriculture extension before, the Digital Green system differs from previous work by using cost-realistic technologies, like pocket video cameras and pico projectors. "We keep the videos localised in terms of language, socio-economic background of the audience," Gandhi says. Digital Green, which r...