Kinnow is now a major cash crop in Punjab,grown across thousands of acres in Abohar,Fazilka,Muktsar,Bathinda,Hoshiarpur and adjoining areas. The juicy fruit has robust markets in metros across the country and its waxing,polishing and grading are high priority for the growers since this significantly increases the marketability of the fruit. While both Punjab and Haryana governments have opened expensive kinnow grading centres,a grower in Bathinda has developed a mobile kinnow grading machine. His effort has ensured that instead of truckloads of the produce going to the centres for washing,waxing,drying and grading,the machine itself comes to the farm for all these jobs. The machine has been developed by Sukhpal Singh Bhullar,winner of the PAU state-level award for best horticultural practices and innovations in 2000,and the National Award for Horticulture in 2002. Bhullar owns kinnow orchards at Ghuman Kalan village in Bathinda district. Bhullar has been sanctioned a grant of Rs 50,000 by the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) to market his machine. Talking to The Indian Express,NABARD Chief General Manager (Punjab) said: The purpose is to encourage him to organise regular demonstrations of this machine,so that small farmers are able to benefit from it. Waxing increases the shelf life of the product. Also,when kinnows of a high grade are packed together,the farmer also gets higher returns. The feedback from the kinnow farmers is good too. According to Vikram Ahuja,a farmer in Fazilka,it is not viable for small farmers to take their produce to the grading centres. It takes both time and money,and the fruit gets spoilt with all the loading and unloading. Since waxing and grading are very important for higher marketability,a mobile grading machine is the right answer, he pointed out. Bhullar has made two versions of the machine,both of which have six grading lines. The smaller one is priced at Rs 75,000. It polishes and grades a tonne of kinnows in an hour. Bhullar has sold this machine to about 20 farmers till now. The bigger version,costing Rs 5.5 lakh,washes,waxes,dries and grades 2.5 tonnes of kinnow every hour. One of these has been sold to a farmer in Hoshiarpur and the other to one in Abohar. Both farmers are now charging Rs 1.5 per kg for entire processing of the produce and subsequent packing. The fruit is then sent to major cities across the nation. This way,the fruit that would have got sold in Punjab mandis in a week is sold out for other cities in a day. The NABARD grant will help me work on my machine more,reduce the diesel consumption and improve the heater,which is extensively used for waxing and drying, said Bhullar.
