FARMER'S NOTEBOOK
Innovations to remove the drudgery of manual labour
M.J. PRABU
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The device can be used to spray one acre of land in 45 minutes
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— Photo: Special Arrangement
Portable: Mansukhbhai Jagani with his bicycle mounted sprayer.
SEED SOWING, an important farm operation needs to be done properly and at the right time. If not, the yield may reduce drastically.
Farmers adopt different methods to ensure proper sowing. Rich farmers opt for tractor or animal operated seed drill for speedy operations while those who cannot afford it, sow manually.
Back breaking work
In manual sowing, traditionally, a hole is made in the land, seed placed in it and then covered by soil, either by sitting or bending down. This becomes painful for the farmers as there are hundreds of such seeds to be placed in the soil. Also, this process consumes a lot of time.
Mr. Mansukbhai Jagani, Amreli district, Gujarat, while working in his small field, thought of developing an implement economical for the farmer and capable of performing sowing function at a faster rate.
With his efforts and innovative brain, he designed and fabricated a seed-cum-fertilizer applicator.
Better usage
Using this device, sowing can be done more efficiently, quickly, and comes cheaper than other options available. The implement helps in sowing the seeds, gap filling, and fertilization of crops such as coconut and banana.
Wastage of seeds and fertilizers is prevented. Due to uniform sowing the germination percentage also increases.
This implement is considered a boon, especially for a region, where manpower shortage is abundant and sowing process requires manual labour.
Another device
Aware of the problems faced in the spraying of agrochemicals in the field, Mr. Jagani, decided to develop an affordable sprayer for farmers. He decided to mount the sprayer on a bicycle, found in almost any household.
The portable spraying system consists of an adjustable boom, tank, chain and sprockets and cam follower mechanism for converting rotary motion to reciprocating motion. The assembly can be mounted on any bicycle available in the market. A cylindrical tank containing the solution is firmly attached to the frame of the bicycle. While the bicycle moves forward, the cam follower provides reciprocating motion to a pump, which compresses the fluid in the tank.
This comes out through the spraying nozzle, connected to the boom, as a mist. The sprayer is energy-efficient and easy to operate and maintain.
Adjustable
Being a flexible product with adjustable height and width it can be used for spraying over various crops.
“Since the bicycle requires less space to move, it can be used in a versatile manner when compared to power sprayers that are mounted on tractors.
“A labour saving device, it can be used to spray one acre of land in 45 minutes, thus covering more area compared to manual spraying. Easy to assemble and dissemble, it serves the dual use of sprayer cum bicycle,” explains the farmer.
According to Professor Anil Gupta, Vice Chairperson, Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, when we refer to India as a knowledge economy, we assume rural people will be employed only in the lowest value-adding activities and never as providers of knowledge.
“That is absurd. It is not only in modern and IT-intensive India that innovation drives people. It is driven by economic enterprise and is well supported by government policies and professionally-educated individuals. The latter [rural inventiveness] is the creation of necessity.
“When you have 11 children and the means to feed only one, then you come up with innovative ideas of distributing the meagre resource to all 11,” says Dr. Anil.
Stress situation
“As a parent, you might also choose to forego your share. This is nothing but a way of thinking that is driven by a stress situation – that of inadequate resources. Rural India is strewn with such examples in all fields of life,” he explains.
For more information contact Mr. Mansukhbhai Jagani, mobile : 9925447400 and Prof Anil Gupta at anilgb@gmail.com and GIAN (Grassroot Innovation Augmentation Network), Ahmedabad, Gujarat, email: mahesh@gian.org, phone: 079-26768696.
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