Dehusking and shelling are important post-harvest activities in maize crop, predominantly done by women. These activities involve a lot of drudgery as these are done manually. Though hand operated maize sheller has somewhat eased the pressure on women, maize shelling with the tool still makes women's lives difficult and yields very low level of output. Moreover, dehusking as a separate activity precedes shelling that brings additional burden on women.
In order to tide over the problem of drudgery and improve the work efficiency, a gender-friendly hand operated maize dehusker-sheller has been developed by Directorate of Research on Women in Agriculture, Bhubaneswar using ergonomic and mechanical considerations for dehusking and shelling. The machine is operated by two persons and requires feeding of cobs one by one. The machine can yield an output of 89.6 kg grain/h when operated by men workers at hand cranking speed of 57 rpm, and 63.4 kg grain/h when operated by women workers at hand cranking speed of 52 rpm. Reduction in drudgery with this equipment was 48.9 percent as compared to dehusking and shelling with hand and it was 38.7 per cent white dehusking with hand & shelling with tubular maize sheller. The equipment can also be operated with 370W single-phase electric motor. With all these features, DRWA dehusker-cum-sheller promises to bring the much needed relief to women involved in the activity.
(Source: DRWA, Bhubaneswar)