Status of farm machinery manufacturers in Madhya Pradesh

Abstract

The adoption level of improved agricultural implements in the state is very low as compared to other progressive parts of the country. Though the modern agricultural machines are considered to be helpful for completing the operation in time with high level of efficiency and better use of agricultural input as compared to their traditional methods/practices. A survey was conducted in eighteen districts covering eight agro-climatic zones of the state using snowball-sampling technique through personal interview. A well-developed and structured proforma was used for knowing the availability of manufacturing facilities, type of implements being manufactured, selling price of equipment, area of manufacturing shed, number of years in this business and their annual turn over. For meaningful analysis of data, their turnover was considered for making classification of manufacturers surveyed viz. small, medium and large categories as this used to be a one of major source for them to enhance their capacity. The study reveals that majority of the manufacturers were of small (46.6%) scale. Among workshop machine, arc-welding set was such machine that are available with all manufacturers. Most of the manufacturers of all categories were making tractor operated cultivators (88.14%), seed-drills (77.9%), trolleys (73.7%), and threshers (72.0%). Mot much variation was observed across categories in selling price of average cost of equipment. Some manufacturers were interested in making/adopting new implements and have some expectations from government organizations.