Ergonomic evaluation of pedal operated arecanut dehusker with women workers in the Konkan region of Maharatshtra

Abstract

Dried arecanut are dehusked at farmer’s house or at small scale processing units by\rmanual labour using country kitchen tool having a wooden plank and curved MS blade. Traditional\rdehusking method is time consuming, highly labour intensive, uneconomical and above all very unsafe\rfor fingers and palms. The developed pedal operated arecanut dehusker was evaluated with nine\rfemale workers to check the suitability of the machine for women workers. Average age, weight and\rstature of the subjects were 26.1(± 8.5) years, 46.7(± 9.6) kg and 158(± 6) cm, respectively. While\raverage HR max and VO2 max were 193.9 (±8.5) bpm and 1.47(± 0.3)l/min, respectively. The mean heart\rrate, oxygen consumption rate and energy expenditure rate for nine subjects were 136.6 bpm, 0.8 l/min\rand 16.56 kJ/min, respectively. The work is under ‘Very heavy’ category (Sen, 1969).