THE MODERN ERA

 

A lot of things have changed, past 2 decades in India. 1^st the economy of the nation and the 2^nd is agriculture of India. We are going to discuss the 2^nd thing here. Old orthodox process and equipment is the old era of Indian farming.  Before 2000 a lot of farmers do not have access modern equipment – tractors, pumps, combine harvesters etc. the reason behind, it was not easy for farmers to buy such heavy equipment on cash. The financing process was not easy and good. But after 2000, lot of govt. and private financing organisation raised with easy pay off loan process. It changed the course of agriculture in India.

That means if a farmer needs a tractor then he/she doesn’t required to buy it via cash, he/she can down payment a 10 or 15% of the tractor’s price and rest of amount will be loaned by any finance organisation. He/she would pay that amount via EMI i.e.- EQUATED MONTHLY INSTALMENT. With this major changes in finance apart Agriculture Development Offices through out the nation helping farmers a lot. ADO’s providing scientifical Agri knowledge to farmers via seminars and also providing pesticides, nutrition products free of cost to a large number of farmers. ADO’s also providing govt. schemes for agriculture heavy equipment and insurance on the corps.

Here is a list of agricultural machinery and tools used in India:- 1. Tractors 2. Combines 3. Micro-Irrigation Equipment 4. Power Tillers 5. Electric Pumps and Motors 6. Seed Bed Preparation 7. Sowing and Planting Equipment 8. Plant Protection Equipment 9. Harvesting and Threshing.   

 

1. Tractors:

Tractors are used for a variety of purposes in the agricultural sector. Over the years, the tractor industry in India has made significant progress in production, capacity addition and technol­ogy indigenization. Both MNCs and home-grown companies provide products with varying horsepower to meet farm requirements.

Tractor sales depend on size of landholding of the farmers, credit availability and income/savings, which depend on a large part on the mon­soons. Though the penetration of tractors has been low, low crop yields, rising labour costs, planting of high yield varieties, modernization and increased mechanization is expected to push the growth in this segment in the next decade.

2. Combines:

Combines are very popular in developed countries. Harvesting with combine harvester is becoming common where workforce is scarce or farms are very large, for example, at the time of wheat harvesting in Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh. More than 48 local manufacturers mainly in Punjab have developed combines, which are self-propelled or tractor operated.

Combines are also used for harvesting paddy, soybean and gram. Entrepreneurs from Rajasthan and Punjab provide combine harvesters to farmers in Maharashtra, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. Two known combines are the Class Crop Tiger and Kartar K3500, which have been tested by Farm Machinery Training and Testing Institute. Institutes have been set up by the government in Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Assam and Andhra Pradesh. They test farm equipment and also conduct training courses in opera­tion, maintenance and repair of farm machinery and equipment. The institutes provide official testing of combine harvesters, farm implements and machinery, irrigation pumps, sta­tionery power engines and plant protection equipment.

3. Micro-Irrigation Equipment:

Micro-irrigation systems supply water directly to the root of plants through a network of plas­tic pipes. Low discharge emitters supply water at slow and regular intervals to plants. Micro-irrigation components consist of pipes, tubes, water-emitting devices, flow control equipment, fittings and accessories. Such systems help in saving water by transporting it to the roots as compared to the traditional way in which the whole field is flooded. It also results in fewer weeds and thus improves crop yields. Micro-irrigation technology is becoming popular with farmers all across the world. It is widely used in the USA, Israel, Australia, parts of Europe and in Asian countries. It is already being used in India and China, and due to a rising population and growing water scarcity, it will be adopted by many more farmers in times to come. Minor irrigation equipment includes micro-irrigation systems, pumps, agriculture pipes, valves and mechanized irrigation systems. Sprinklers such as spray, mist, drippers, micro-jets, fan jets, micro-sprayers and foggers are also used.

 

4. Power Tillers:

Power tillers are mini-tractors with two wheels and rotary tillers and are useful in small farms. They replace animal power. Sud (2021) writes that these are very popular in paddy cultivation in Japan, but not so in India, where tractors are preferred. Tractors sell about 700,000 units per year in India, while power tillers sell less than one-tenth of that, with most of the sales happening in the southern and north-eastern states.

A power tiller is cheaper than a small tractor and has lower diesel consumption though it takes longer to complete the same job. Besides, the maintenance cost of power tillers is also far lower than that of tractors. Power tillers are more economical even for other uses, such as for running water pumps and grain threshers. It is especially useful in undulated and hilly ter­rains. There has been a steady growth in the sales of power tillers in the country. However, power tillers have not been very popular with Indian farmers. One reason is that while operating, a person has to walk behind it to guide it, which not only increases drudgery but can also be hazardous. A remote control system is probably the answer, and one has been developed by Mangalore Robautonics but is yet to catch on. Second, farmers like the status attached to a bigger machine and thus prefer to buy a tractor instead.

 

5. Electric Pumps and Motors:

Electric motors and diesel engines are used in agriculture and are the primary sources of sta­tionary power for irrigation, threshing and various post-harvest agro-processing operations. Indian pumps are made according to the specifications of the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS). Agricultural pump industries are situated in Coimbatore, Ahmedabad, Baroda, Kolkata and Dewas. Rajkot, Agra and Kolhapur are famous for oil engines.

The most popular pumps are single phase monoblock pumpsets from 0.5 hp to 2 hp range, selling about two million sets a year, followed by three-phase monoblock pumpsets 2 hp to 30 hp range and submersible pumpsets 3 hp to 30 hp range, selling 600,000 sets each per year. Bigger pumps consisting of diesel engines up to 10 hp and above 10 hp are also popular. As water tables go down in the country, larger pumps and motors will be required in the future.

 

 

6. Seed Bed Preparation:

Various cultivators, disc harrow, mould board plough, puddler, disc harrow-cum-puddler, peg tooth harrow, spring tine harrow, rotavator and patela harrow operated by animal and tractor are the improved implements which have been adopted by farmers. Different sizes of cultivators and disc harrows are used.

7. Sowing and Planting Equipment:

Line-sowing helps in regulated application of fer­tilizers near the root zone. Mechanical weeders are used to control weeds. Mechanically metered seed drills and seed-cum-fertilizer drills operated by animals and tractors have been developed.

8. Plant Protection Equipment:

Weed control in irrigated and rain-fed agriculture during the kharif season is required and various equipment is available for it. Khurpis, long handle wheel hoe and peg type weeders, bullock-operated weeder and cultivator are also used for control of weeds. Low-cost hand-operated sprayers and dusters are also available.

9. Harvesting and Threshing:

Harvesting and threshing equipment is used to reduce costs of production and reduction in harvest/post-harvest losses, non-availability of labour during the harvesting period. They are also used to reduce drudgery in opera­tions. Harvesting is done in several ways—manually with sickle, with animal or station­ary power threshers operated by diesel engines, electric motors or tractor power.