Cost effectiveness of manually operated intercultural equipments

In order to ease the operation of interculture in the hilly regions of Jammu and Kashmir State, where the land holdings are small and rainfall/snowfall is the major source of irrigation. A number of deweeding equipments were fabricated at the cooperating centre based on anthropometric survey conducted at the selected sites of Jammmu and Kashmir state. The weeders were fabricated with a view to reduce the drudgery involved with the use of traditional tools. The fabricated tools and equipments were tested for wheat, maize and mustard in both rabi and kharif seasons" A comparison was made between various fabricated hoes and traditional methods of performing deweeding operations in the field. The use of developed! fabricated tools showed an increase in yield by 5–8% and saving in labour and cost by 65%-70% and 70–80% respectively in comparison to conventional methods of dweeding.