MULTAN: Central Cotton Research Institute (CCRI) conducted successful demonstration of mechanized picking of cotton from field, here on Wednesday.
It was first time in country’s history that cotton was picked by a machine at the Institute. The machine was imported from Uzbekistan for on-going season of cotton. A three-member team from Uzbekistan also reached Multan to supervise the working of machine.
CCRI Director Dr Zahid Mehmood informed that the machine could manage cotton picking from 10 to 12 acres in a day. Similarly, the machine could help meet shortage of cotton-picker labourers as it could work equal to working 1,500 labourers.
He said the country was faced with shortage of women labourers, adding that cotton picker machines would be the future of the country. He maintained that cotton picking experiments were being conducted on different varieties in the Institute. He added the machine was not suitable for all varieties of cotton. However, cotton varieties having 80 to 120 cm height and nearly 90 cm width of rows could be picked easily.
Cotton Commissioner Dr Khalid Abdullah felicitated the CCRI for conducting cotton picking experiments by machine.
