Performance Assessment of BRRI and Imported Self-Propelled Rice Transplanters in Bangladesh during Aman Season

Abstract

Mechanical rice transplanting has been emerged as an alternative of traditional rice transplanting in Bangladesh. This study aimed to compare the performance of the BRRI-developed and imported self-propelled 4-row walking-type rice transplanters to identify which model is more efficient, cost-effective, and suitable for local field conditions to support sustainable rice cultivation. Field trials were executed in a mechanized village and on a farmer’s field in Jashore during the Aman season of 2023 to minimize the expenses associated with the operations of rice transplanting. The performance of the BRRI-developed 4-row self-propelled rice transplanter was shown to be significantly superior to that of imported rice transplanters and manual transplanting methods. The field capacity, field efficiency, and fuel consumption of the 4-row self-propelled rice transplanter that was BRRI developed and imported were as follows: 40.12 decimal/hr, 79.50%, 1.52 lit/hr, and 35.73 decimal/hr, 78.03%, and 1.32 lit/hr, respectively. The cost of BRRI- developed and imported 4-row self-propelled rice transplanter was determined to be BDT 1200-1500 per decimal, in contrast to BDT 3500 per decimal for the traditional manual transplanting method employed by farmers in the Jashore region. The machine was determined to be more practical and user-friendly for farmers when compared to manual rice transplanting in terms of time, money and labour requirements.