Sustainable Paddy Harvesting Solution for the Southern Delta of Bangladesh

Abstract

Abstract. Southern Delta of Bangladesh is lagging behind in adoption of agricultural machinery due to its agro-ecological characteristics in contrast with the rest of the country. Agriculture in this region is characterized by low productivity due to salinity, water logging, limiteduse of modern technologies, inadequate control over water resources and repeated crop losses due to natural calamities like cyclone, tidal surge, flood, etc. Harvesting is one of the areas that need machinery intervention for reduction of cost, time and losses. Three types of harvesting machines namely reaper, mini-combine and small to medium size combine harvesters are available options for paddy harvesting in Bangladesh. The main objective of the study was to identify appropriate paddy harvesting machines forsouthern delta of Bangladesh. The experiments were conducted to evaluate the technical and economic performances of reaper (Model: Vikyno AR 120), mini combine harvester (Model: 4LBZ-110) and combine harvester (Model-AG600GA) in compared to manual harvesting of paddy. The result shows that effective field capacity of the combine harvester was 0.45 ha/h in comparison to reaper (0.22 ha/h) and mini-combine harvester (0.09 ha/h). Cost savings of combine harvester was 61% over manual harvesting compared to reaper (45%) and mini-combine harvester (51%). Similarly, combine harvester saves 70% labor over manual harvesting. The estimated BCR (Benefit Cost Ratio) and pay-back period of combine harvester were 1.62 and 2.08 year, respectively. The average total harvesting loss of combine harvester was found 1.62% which was significantly less than manual harvesting (6.36%). In addition to this, harvesting of 100% shattered paddy, even in water logged and wet conditions are possible by combine harvester. But, reaper and mini-combine harvester cannot harvest paddy in such conditions. Due to climate prone vulnerability, it is also necessary to harvest large area of paddy within short time. Therefore, combine harvester would be an appropriate option for harvesting paddy in southern delta of Bangladesh. Based on these findings, the government of Bangladesh comes up with a program to popularize three thousand units small to medium size combine harvester and two thousands units of reaper with 60% subsidy in the country by 2020-21 fiscal year.