Improving Automation in Banana Plantations: Mechanical Means for Bunch Collection and Spraying

The plant size and structure, together with the layout of the plantation, often constitute an obstacle for automation of main cropping operations in banana cultivation: while handling is normally managed quite successfully, other operations, such as harvesting, are still widely done manually and others, such as spraying, are long and complex to carry out, being aerial spraying a controverse technique. However mechanization of agricultural operations in banana fields not only is, as for other cultivations, one of the principal means of increasing productivity and reducing costs, especially where labour is scarce or expensive, but contributes also in reducing fatigue and hazards for workers. Efforts for developing specific equipment are ongoing but often based on extemporaneous adjustment of existing machinery. The authors provide a critical description of three self-moving implements designed to carry out some important operations in banana plantations and therefore capable of moving easily within the rows with minimum soil compaction: a 97 kW tractor equipped with extensible arm, pincer and sickle for harvesting of bunches, a small 15 kW tracked carrier with a similar device and an 85 kW atomizer with a two-level distribution apparatus for contemporaneous spraying above and under the canopy. The former two have been tested in the Canary Islands, while the latter is still in the planning stage.