Design and Development of a Knowledge-Based System for Diagnosing Diseases in Banana Plants

Farmers usually find it difficult to identify and treat various diseases in banana plants (BPs) because it demands a wide spectrum of tacit knowledge. This situation motivated the authors to design and develop a technology-assisted knowledge base (KB) system for farmers, in order to diagnose and treat diseases in BPs. As a preliminary step towards building the KB, a set of images of diseases in BPs were taken from the manual published by Vegetable and Fruit Promotion Council Keralam (VFPCK). These sets of images were used to collect data from the agricultural experts and experienced farmers about the symptoms and remedies of various diseases in BPs. The data was collected from the participants by conducting semi-structured interview and then analysed to design the KB system. Since the diagnosis of diseases was a subjective process, an inter-rater reliability check was done on the data, using Cohen’s Kappa method. Then using this data, a KB system has been designed and developed as a mobile app named as ‘Ban-Dis’. An initial usability study has been conducted on this prototype among a few farmers, and their feedbacks have been recorded. The study results are promising and warrant further enhancements to the system. The KB system would be more beneficial as indicated by the farmers if the interface was in vernacular language.