Increasing Farmers Income through Mechanization in Temperate Fruit Crops of Jammu and Kashmir State

The level of farm mechanization in the state is very poor and badly hampered by terraced, small and irregular fields, undulating topography, lack of skilled manpower, poor facilities of repair and maintenance and manufacturing of implements. The state being hilly and the composition of crops grown differ significantly from rest of the country. The growing labour scarcity and increasing wage rates in the state are further pushing the farmers towards the wall. It was in this backdrop that the machines were designed and fabricated by the SKUAST-Kashmir to meet the mechanised solutions for some of major fruit crops. The designed machines, viz. motorised walnut dehuller, motorised and manual almond dehuller and apricot harvester were evaluated at field conditions and found cost-effective with high output efficiency. The potential cost minimizations with the designed machines were found significant, thereby, increasing farmers’ income. The farmer groups may own and operate these machines on collective basis and may also provide them on custom hiring basis to other farmers who can not afford to purchase these machines. There lies ample scope for entrepreneurship development in the mechanized farm service sector of the state, wherein, these newly designed machines may be owned by an entrepreneur to provide them to farmers on custom hiring basis or act as service provider company for harvest and post-harvest operations.