Evaluation of Organic and Inorganic Dust Concentration in Different Mechanized Agricultural Operations for Wheat Crop

Abstract

Agricultural dusts are generated due to crop production activities such as ploughing, seed bed preparation, sowing, harvesting and threshing. The present study was undertaken for evaluation of organic and inorganic dust concentration in different agricultural operations in Wheat crop cultivation. The dust concentration at two locations (near to operator seat on tractor and at by-stander position) for ploughing, seed bed preparation, sowing and harvesting operations. Whereas, the dust concentration for threshing operation were taken at three locations viz. feeding chute, bhusa outlet and grain outlet positions. A real -time personal dust monitor was used to measure the dust levels after every 15 min of operation. In this measurement 2.5 µm, 10 µm and TSP size sampling head were used. The measured dust concentration levels were compared with standard exposure limits defined by OSHA. The range of environmental parameters such as Temperature ( 0 C), Relative humidity (%) and Wind speed (m/sec) were also measured by using WBGT monitor. Moisture content of soil (%) and tractor forward speed (km/h) were also measured for field operations. It was found that, all the operations, the dust concentrations were well below the standard exposure limits in wheat production.