Agrotechnology

Comparative ergonomical study of women workers on two-row rice transplanter and cono-weeder

2^nd International Conference on Agricultural & Horticultural Sciences

Radisson Blu Plaza Hotel, Hyderabad, India February 03-05, 2014

P Vivek, Basavaraj and Vinayaka

Accepted Abstracts: Agrotechnol

Abstract:

Manual transplanting of rice seedlings in puddled field is a widely accepted cultivation practice in India and one of the labor-intensive operations in agriculture. It also involves enormous drudgery, as women workers, who perform most of the operation in India, have to work in bending posture in sweltering weather. Interculture/weeding operation in paddy crop is very important operation which is done mostly in humid environment under scorchy heat. Farm worker used to uproot the weeds by hand in bending position that might affect their health. As known that weeds in upland rice field comes more easily than low land rice. Two-row manual rice trans-planters and a cono-weeder have been ergonomically evaluated in the field work for assessing their suitability for use by farm women and for determining the physiological workload with women workers. Each women worker operated the equipment for 30 minutes. The mean heart rates of women workers during transplanting with two-row transplanter and cono-weeder were 138 beats/min and 153 beats/min respectively. The area covered was found to be 103.4 m 2 /h and 165 m 2 /h respectively. Higher average heart rate of worker in operation of both equipments suggests for use of equipment in small area with adequate rest pause to the worker. It is also suggested based on experiment that two workers may be engaged in shift for day long work with the equipment.

Biography :

P Vivek has completed BTech (Ag. Engg.) from AEC & RI, Kumulur, Tiruchirapally and presently pursuing MTech (Ag. Engg.) from the Dept. of Farm Power and Machinery, TNAU, Coimbatore.