Abstract

The present research work has been carried out at Central Research Station farm of Dr. PDKV, Akola and at
Katkheda and Sutala village of the Akola and Bulbhana district respectively. The operations considered were land
preparation, sowing, intercultural, harvesting and crop residue management etc. The inputs like human power,
bullock power for traditional operation were studied in entire work of the research. Similarly, for the same crops
these operations were carried out by the mechanized practice for the exact quantification of the operational energy
input. The study reflects the energy use patterns in mechanized and traditional farming and optimized energy
efficient cropping system through mechanized farming over traditional farming. The practices evaluated for the
crop production which resulted in the high yielding of crop and the crop residues.
On the basis of results obtained, it was observed that the traditional operational energy requirement increases from
2680.78 MJ/ha in traditional method to 3130.72 MJ/ha in mechanized method for green gram crop. While, there is
decrease in cost of operation from Rs 8407.5/ha in traditional method to Rs 5147.0/ha in mechanized system.
Similar trend was observed in cotton, soybean, sorghum and wheat crop. For all the crops seed bed preparation is
done by tractors in traditional as well as mechanized method except in mechanized method land smoothening is
done by self propelled tiller instead of bullock drawn blade harrow. In most of the crops the farm operations were
mechanized with different implements except harvesting operation, due to unavailability of appropriate machine for harvesting of crops except wheat crop. Overall it seen that the application of modern implements and
machineries for the crop production over the traditional practices reduces the cost of production which surely
impact on the crop production and the net income of the farmers.

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