The Department of Agriculture of the Karnataka government has launched a programme to mechanise agricultural operations in the state to help farmers facing farm labour shortage.
To this end, the department had organised a display of machines for planting paddy seedlings under the National Farm Expansion Scheme here at the Mysore University senate building premises in Manasa Gangotri.
Paddy seedling planting machines ranging in prices from Rs 1.80 lakh to Rs 9 lakh manufactured by different companies were demonstrated before invited farmers from Mysore, Mandya, Hassan, Chikmagalur and Tumkur. These machines can plant seedlings in four to eight rows at a time.
The government is offering a subsidy on the cost of these machines. It has set apart over Rs 100 crore for promoting mechinisation of agricultural operations. Apart from manpower savings, these machines help farmers reduce the cost of farm operations, increase yield and returns.
According to Director of Agriculture K V Sarvesh, paddy cultivated on about 1.45 million hectares was the main crop of the state. In view of increasing farm labour shortage of recent, mechanisation of its operation has turned vital. Hence, the government had decided to offer 50 per cent subsidy on the Rs 1.80 lakh paddy planting machine as well as other machines costing higher prices.
The Rs 2.30 lakh VST Company machine, for which a subsidy of Rs 95,000 is available, can plant in four rows simultaneously, while another machine costing Rs 1.65 lakh for which subsidy is Rs 77,000 can plant seedings in eight rows at a time. Another machine costing Rs 2.35 lakh would get a subsidy of Rs 95,000 and needs to operated by two persons. Yet another one costing Rs 9.9 lakh would be eligible for Rs 4 lakh subsidy.
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Besides this, an incentive amount of Rs 1,000 will be paid to the farmers per acre. The amount will be directly remitted to their bank accounts.
Lamenting the increasing wastage of water and fertiliser, the director said fertiliser consumption had gone up from 1.7 million to 4.2 million tonnes in the state, though its production had not risen to meet the demand.
He therefore called for the scientific usage of water and fertiliser.
Around 3 million farmers were deriving benefit from the ‘Bhoochetana’ scheme meant to increase production in rain-fed areas. It would be more advantageous for farmers to take to mechanical farming. They could buy these machines by forming societies, he said.
Citing Egypt where yield of 130 quintals of paddy per acre and Israel where water used for paddy irrigation was valued in terms of dollars, Karnataka Agricultural Mission President S A Patil asked the farmers to make use of the high-yielding seeds irrespective of its manufacturer or the brand. Farm scientists too should accept seeds traditionally developed by the farmers, he said.