Launched: Five decades of district-level data across India
Dr Prabhu Pingali elaborates on the significance of the DLD tool for socioeconomic research in India. Photos: P Srujan, ICRISAT
The ICRISAT Governing Board launched the District-level Database (DLD) tool for India – a ‘one-stop shop for rich meso-level data for 19 states across India’.
The DLD is a database of district-level data that has been maintained from the year 1966. Updated to the latest available year, 2016, DLD aims to be a link between country-level macro data and household-level micro data. It identifies relevant districts/regions that would help target technology dissemination, pro-poor programs and development initiatives.
This is part of a project on ‘Updating the meso-level database for India and developing an interactive tool for public access and use’, jointly supported by Tata Cornell Institute on Nutrition and Agriculture (TCI) and ICRISAT. The database is being released in the form of a web-based interactive tool with a dashboard and spatial maps to allow quick access and extraction of relevant information.
The database, updated under ICRISAT’s Village Dynamics in South Asia (VDSA) project, includes key core variables related to crop and livestock sectors, such as irrigation, inputs, weather, infrastructure, demography, operational holdings, etc. Its scope is being expanded by inclusion of data on soft infrastructure related to health, education, credit, GDP, environment (AET, PET, temperature, soil moisture etc.) and nutrition for available years.
The web-based interactive tool will allow quick access and extraction of relevant information. Different stakeholders such as researchers, development planners and donors will have the flexibility to extract and visualize data to be useful for decision-making and research.
States in this database include Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Odisha, Punjab, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal.
