Imagine a battery-powered machine that works on a mere 12-volts, designed distinctly with dual rotating arms each stretching to a length of 10 cm. Attached to each arm, you’ll find springs on both sides, exploding with energy and ready to extract precious coffee beans from their branches. This ingenious coffee contraption is a brainchild of an esteemed institute operating under the broad wings of the Department of Agriculture. On Tuesday, it unveiled its innovative creation with much anticipation.
Fitted at the foundation of the coffee tree, a nylon net, with broad dimensions of 1.2 x 1.5 metres and a depth of half a metre, gently cradles the fallen beans, collecting and securing each valuable nugget.
Trials brought forth impressive results: the institutional test run experimented on Robusta coffee bean harvesting and observed a remarkable increase in average output. A rate of 85.18 kg. per hour was recorded, 1.81 times higher than the output achieved manually by human pickers, which is recorded at an average efficiency of 46.91 kg. per hour.
When tasked with Arabica coffee bean harvest, this machine demonstrated even greater efficacy. An output of 30.54 kg. per hour was clocked, proving itself as more than twice as efficient as manual labour, which only garners about 15 kg. per hour.
News of such a breakthrough has been quick to spread, leading a private company to approach the institute for machine blueprints for mass production. The commercial adaption of this compact, handheld coffee picking wizard is estimated to carry a price of 4,900 baht, and it promises an impressive reduction of labour cost by 40% for coffee farmers.
Coffee beans hold a significant place in Thailand’s booming economic landscape, contributing an estimated value of 5.5 billion baht annually. A flourishing coffee canvas covers over 260,000 rai of land, with two distinct varieties gracing the plantations: Arabica coffee veil the northern lands, while Robusta coffee emboldens the south.
Up until now, the labour-intensive harvest of coffee beans has been carried out predominantly by hand, attracting labour costs anywhere between 5-8 baht per kg. The advent of this formidable coffee picking innovation could spell a transformation in the industry’s operations.
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