Influence of field slope on manual harvesting indicators on citrus in the agricultural sector in Caldas-Colombia

Abstract

In Colombia the agricultural sector has difficulties in the integration of technologies, due to the difficulties of the topography, very characteristic in the area of Colombian mountain ranges that pass through the main agricultural departments of the country and the limitations of human capacity; the citrus harvesting process has traditionally been done by hand, employing thousands of people who do not achieve significant yields; , thus causing an increase in production costs with an impact on harvest indicators, measured in terms of quality and productivity. This study aims to determine the impact of field slope conditions on quality indicators and indicators of effectiveness, efficiency, and loss indictors, used to evaluate the productivity of the orange harvesting process in a case study in the Department of Caldas-Colombia in order to identify opportunities for process improvement. Field information was made on orange-producing farms with different land slopes classified into four categories. Statistically significant partnerships were identified between the efficiency, efficiency and loss indicators and the field slope conditions. In addition, some of these indicators showed inverse relationships to the slope gradient. On the contrary, the quality of the fruit is not affected by the slope conditions of the land.