BIHOC PLUS LTD is in the business of developing and marketing innovative and appropriate agricultural mechanisation technologies and methodologies to make cassava production smart, and attractive to the youth. In pursuit of the above, an innovative tractor drawn TEK mechanical cassava harvester (TEK MCH) has been developed in Ghana.
The device is patented and deployed in some African countries and Jamaica. Africa produces over 64% of global cassava mainly for food security but contributes a negligible proportion to the export market. The main challenge to cassava production for industry and export in Africa is the reliance on the manual tools and traditional haphazard planting by smallholder farmers, who dominate the sector. Manual cassava harvesting at a rate of 5-10 minutes per plant is the greatest challenge to its industrial demand for processing and export. Manual harvesting when the ground is hard is slow and associated with high physical pain and root damage.
The TEK mechanical harvester marketed by BIHOC PLUS Ltd, has been developed to break the labour bottleneck and physical pain associated with cassava harvesting. The device is light (300 kg) and can be pulled by any medium 60-75 hp tractors available with most farmers and tractor owners in Africa. In operation, the harvester penetrates beneath the root cluster to depths of 25 cm or higher and at tractor speeds of 5 km/h, uprooting one plant per second or less giving a field capacity of 1.9 to 2.5 h/ha and tuber damage of 5-10 percent. After mechanical harvesting, the field is left ploughed with additional savings on fuel, time, cost and other resources for the next season crop. Ridge planting is recommended as it gives a higher root yield, low root damage, and is compliant with conservation and precision agricultural practices, and climate action.
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