Mechanization is critical for the modernization & commercialization of the agriculture sector because it increases productivity and timeliness of agricultural operations, aids in value addition, reduces cultivation costs, and allows for climate change adaptation.
Keeping this in mind, on the sixth day of the 'Jai Kisan Jai Vigyan' Week, Krishi Jagran has organized a webinar on ‘Acceleration of Mechanization in Agriculture’ to discuss the importance and the growing role of mechanization in Agriculture.
Krishi Jagran's Shruti Joshi-Content Manager (Hindi) welcomed all guests & moderated the entire session. The discussion was started by Gurpreet Singh, a Progressive Farmer from Chandigarh, Punjab. He highlighted the role and significance of farm machinery that brought the green revolution during the ’60s. Furthermore, he highlighted the problem of electricity faced by farmers and urged the government to enable them with solar-powered electricity along with subsidies for the latest farm equipment.
Dr. Mukesh Jain, the Director, Northern Region farm Machinery Training Institute & Assistant Professor, CCS Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar, Haryana, began his speech by thanking the entire Krishi Jagran team. He then discussed the Sub-Mission on Agricultural Mechanization (SMAM), which is an initiative in this direction, and informed that the government is already providing a 40% subsidy to the Unreserved category and a 50% subsidy to SC/STs when purchasing farm machinery.
Pankaj Jha, Country Head, Sales and Operation, Maschio Gaspardo Group, thanked Krishi Jagran for giving such a platform to speak out. He said- Farm Mechanization is the need of the hour to increase the yield per acre of land as we have a lot of arable land about 58 % (while world average- 10 %).
He suggested that sarpanchs & progressive farmers should be properly trained in the use of cutting-edge Agri Tech so that they can effectively train other farmers in the region.
Pradip Patel, Managing Director of Prime UAV, began his speech by citing an example of the importance of drones in dealing with a locust attack last year in the Dantewada region of Maharashtra. He claims that mobile phones can fully automate this process and that you can easily select the area for spraying in the field. We can save 30-40% of pesticides by using drone technology.
According to Dr. CP Sawant, Senior Scientist, Agricultural Mechanization Division, ICAR- Central Institute of Agricultural Engineering, Bhopal, mechanization in farming lowers agricultural production costs and has the potential to increase crop yield. He also suggested that farm mechanization should not be limited to Tractorization but should include other important technologies such as precision farming, artificial intelligence, remote sensing, and so on.
Dr. Pradeep Rajan, Senior Principal Scientist, CSIR-Central Mechanical Engineering Research Institute, West Bengal, suggested that farmers be properly trained in how to use modern technology efficiently. He also suggested that farm equipment be tailored to the type & terrain of the land in order to effectively harness it.
With this, the programme was concluded by Shruti Nigam, Content Manager, Krishi Jagran with the vote of thanks.
