Impact of harvesting and threshing methods of rice: A comprehensive review on seed quality and storage behaviour
2025
Jeya Chandra, R | Masilamani, P | Suthakar, B | Rajkumar, P | Sivakumar, S D | Manonmani, V
Rice, being a staple food produced on a large scale production accounts for more than 135 million tonnes in the year 2023. Harvesting and threshing operations are important and influential processes on quality, quantity and production cost in rice. Harvesting the rice crops using sickles is a common method is a labour-intensive process that causes labour shortages and often delay seed losses, grain loss due to over maturity, inefficient techniques may cause seed quality deterioration, shattering of seeds, post-harvest losses of 30 % and mechanical damage. Threshing, cleaning and winnowing causes various problems with post harvest losses, seed breakage, improper removal of stones, debris, chaffy materials in the paddy seed. To overcome these techniques harvesting and threshing can be done by mechanized harvesting using combine harvester offers an alternate solution. Combine harvester allows timely harvesting while minimizing losses. However, improper adjustment in machine harvesting can cause mechanical damage with reduced seed quality. These factors impact on seed yield as well as storage, inadequate drying, seed spillage and viability loss, which results reduction in a germination potential. The ideal moisture content of 20-25 % for harvesting rice is usually too high for safe storage with low mechanical losses. Additionally, employing hermetic storage techniques and controlled drying processes further enhance seed longevity and quality by preventing microbial contamination, pest and insect damage. Implementing these improved methods can significantly reduce post harvest losses, ensure better seed quality and improve the storability of rice which address the growing demand for seed production over traditional methods.
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