Kerala is the leading producer of Black Pepper, king of spices in India. The harvesting of pepper is of great concern to the farmers. The shortage of labour during harvesting and their high wages causes a burden to pepper farmers. The delay in harvest reduces quality. The machine developed was expected to bridge the gap between supply and demand of pepper. The machine consists of a motor, mainframe, harvesting and conveying unit and collecting bag. Initial testing of the developed model was conducted under field condition. The tests revealed that the developed model was successful and effective for harvesting pepper due to its better conveying mechanism towards the collecting bag. With few modifications, the harvester could be made available for commercial production.

An experiment was carried out at Agricultural Research Station, Mannuthy, Kerala to evaluate the effect of nutripriming on tray nursery technique in rice. Nutripriming treatments viz. priming with 0.1% urea, 0.01% borax, 0.05% ZnSO4, combinations of urea with borax and ZnSO4, combination of urea, borax and ZnSO4, 1% Pseudomonas fluorescens and 1% PGPR mix I were applied to seeds grown in seedling trays filled with growing media containing 60% rice husk 154 charcoal + 20% soil + 20% coir pith compost. Combined application of urea, zinc and borax was superior with respect to growth parameters of seedling and mat characteristics. Higher Ca, Mg, S and B uptake was also observed in this treatment. Hence, nutripriming with 0.1% Urea + 0.05% ZnSO4 + 0.01% Borax was found to be a better practice for quality tray nursery production in rice.

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