A Review Study on Existing Manually Operated Seed Planter for Marginal Farmers of India

Abstract

A review of manually operated planting machines in India is presented. The present study show in general that the suitability of manually operated planting machines for different seed and land holdings. Farm mechanization is an important element of agriculture. Mechanization of agriculture is an essential input in modern agriculture. Mechanization also helps in improving utilization efficiency of other inputs, safety, and comfort of the agricultural worker, improvement in the quality and value addition of the produce. Looking at the pattern of land holdings in India, it may be noted that about 84% of holdings are below one hectare. In the existing scenario of the land fragmentation and resulting continued shrinkage of average size of operational holdings, percentage of marginal, small and semi medium operational land holdings is likely to increase. Such small land holding makes individual ownership agriculture machinery uneconomic and operationally unavailable. The basic objective of sowing operation is to put the seed in rows at desired depth and seed to seed spacing, cover the seeds with soil and provide proper compaction over the seed. The recommended row to row spacing, seed rate, seed to seed spacing and depth of seed placement vary from crop to crop and for different agroclimatic conditions to achieve optimum yields. Seed sowing devices plays a wide role in agriculture field. Here in this study efforts are taken to design and develop a manually operated seed planting machine which is suitable for marginal land holdings and plant the seed at specific distance with specific quantity and reduce the requirement of seed per unit area and with suitable furrow covering device.