Farmer Participatory Refinements and Adoption of CRIDA Bullock Drawn Planter in Latur District of Maharashtra

Three-row multi-crop bullock drawn planter developed by Central Research Institute for Dryland Agriculture, Hyderabad was tested, refined and demonstrated for sowing soybean and other dryland crops on farmers’ field during 2008–13. Its performance evaluation was carried out with conventional sowing by bullock drawn tifan. Based on farmers feedback and on-field observations; refinements such as scrapper on ground wheel, boot with seed and fertilizer delivery pipes, fluted roller type fertilizer agitator and increased hole size on fertilizer controlling lever were incorporated in the planter. Field tests showed that the refined planter performed well for sowing soybean, soybean + pigeonpea, chickpea, sorghum and groundnut crops in the district. The field capacity of the planter was 2 ha/day with an average field efficiency of 75% and an average sized bullock could easily pulled it. The planter saved 9–27% seed, 63–75% labour and increased crop yield by 11–20% as compared to conventional sowing by bullock drawn tifan.