GREEN CANE HARVESTER
There is yet no suitable cane harvester available in India to harvest cane except a few trials being conducted by the Indian Institute of Sugarcane Research, Lucknow to develop a tractor drawn harvester. However, there is urgent need of developing a harvester suited to harvesting cane with closer inter-row spacing of 75-90 cm followed in India. The Australian chopper cane harvester designed for wider inter-row spacing of 150 cm has recently been introduced by Sakthi Sugars in Tamil Nadu which is proving successful. The wider inter-row spacing of 135-150 cm is possible in India without any adverse effect on cane yield. This harvester should be introduced in India, with suitable modifications, if need be, to bring about mechanization in cane harvesting. This is a single row cane harvester but can cut two rows simultaneously if paired row planting of 30:30-150– 30:30 is followed in India.
An Indian company Khalsa Farm Equipment works at Meerut in Uttar Pradesh state is also engaged in developing a tractor drawn whole cane harvester with off-loading arrangement in a trolley. This harvester is proposed to be designed for 75-90 cm inter-row spacing followed in India. Cane harvesters being used in countries like Australia are both for burnt cane and green cane harvesting, the recent trend being a shift to green cane harvesting.