1Scientist, Central Research Institute for Dryland Agriculture, Hyderabad-500 059
2Sr. Res. Engineer, Department of Farm Machinery and Power Engineering, School of Renewable Energy Engineering, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana
3Professor, School of Renewable Energy Engineering, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana
4Principal Scientists, Central Research Institute for Dryland Agriculture, Hyderabad-500 059
*Corresponding author's mail id: ashishdhimate@yahoo.in
Online published on 2 January, 2019.
Chickpea is one of the important leguminous food crop, grown across different agro ecological sub-regions of India. Total area under chickpea in India is 8.25 million ha, whereas, its production was 7.33 million tonnes in the year 2014–15. It is grown in 52 countries with India contributing to 15.95 and 15.51% in area and production of chickpea, respectively. In chickpea production, there are some common operations at par with other pulses crops for which general machineries could be utilized with little adjustments/modifications. However, the operation like harvesting and threshing have really been facing problem due to nonavailability of suitable combine machine/harvester and threshers. The growers are not able to meet high labour wages as there is shortage of labour in the peak season. In combine harvesting, chickpea crop physical parameters are the main constraints. In this article, need of farm mechanization, availability and developmental aspects of various machineries for sowing, intercultural operations, pest control, harvesting, threshing and current status of combine harvesting of chickpea in India and other countries is discussed.
Chickpea mechanization, Sowing, Threshing, Combine harvesting
