Mela on technology, machinery begins
Source: The Sangai Express
Imphal, March 19 2016 :
Two-day technology and machinery demonstration mela was formally inaugurated today at the Department of Agriculture Engineering, College of Agriculture, Central Agricul-tural University (CAU), Imphal which was organized by the All India Coordinated Research Project on Post Harvest Engineering and Technology, CAU.
Dean, College of Agricultural University Prof JM Laishram attended the function as the chief guest while HOD of Agriculture and Engineering Department, College of Agriculture, CAU Prof Y Jekendra was the functional president.
President of All Manipur Trained Medicinal and Aromatic Plants Promoters Consortium Devkanta was the guest of honour.
The mela which began yesterday was attended by 170 farmers from different parts of the State.
The formal inauguration programme held today was attended by about 120 farmers.
Addressing the farmers, Asst Prof, Department of Agriculture Engineering Dr Ng Joykumar said 'climate chan-ge in global scenario has severely affected the crop yield which results in failure to meet the production cost for most of the crops'.
Critical operations like sowing, inter-cultivation, harvesting and threshing for important crops are some other obstacles in achieving high productivity, he said.
Farm mechanization is one of the major activities which can reduce the cost of cultivation and increase the productivity with use of improved implements and perform timely operation at different stages of crop cultivation.
Adoption of traditional farming practices with the available resources is also one of the reasons for fewer yields compared to the cost of production.
There is great potential of processing locally avail able produces into value added products using different technology and machinery introduced in the mela, he added.