Attached photo of paddy harvesting in the east.
The reaping is entirely by machine and out come threshed paddy for
packaging straight into bags.
Husking paddy is at the nearby rice mills.
There is a profitable symbiosis, the millers readily advancing the large
amount of money ( I think it is about Rs 11000 per day to hire a thresher)
needed to hire machinery as they get to buy and mill it soon after.
The machine is dubbed the 'Kamatha' as it does all the work of the
traditional manual cutting and threshing formerly often using oxen.
A kilo of rice- kekulu- ranges from around Rs 40 up. Of course no stones or
weevils.
In comparison, a kilo of wheat flour is over Rs 100 and no one misses it
much- many having more rice meals. At that price, no one ever dilutes haal
piti appa or indi aappa! 100% haal!
Ah and rotti and pittu too with some lunu miris.
Though I love that fresh spongy wheat floour bunnis with a sour plantain, or
more modernly the crusty sugared kimbula bunnis or gnana katha ! ( Will be
seeing ya at Mihintale this weekend!)
The govt. does gives a large subsidy as fertilser.
With this set up, it is profitable to farm paddy unlike decades ago when the
poor got their measure of free rice from Burma and Thailand making farming a
losing venture.
Then we also depended on subsidized wheat flour from America under that
famous-infamous- Pl 480 scheme.
Recalling the 1940s the inimitable Lakshmi Bhai sang the satire;
' herali bathala tika nupurudu amma, rata haale buth kaala.... kiri nethi
hinda rata kiri deela."
jksw
The rural peasantry which harvested the paddy manually is now unemployed.
PGV
The reaping is entirely by machine and out come threshed paddy for
packaging straight into bags.
Husking paddy is at the nearby rice mills.
There is a profitable symbiosis, the millers readily advancing the large
amount of money ( I think it is about Rs 11000 per day to hire a thresher)
needed to hire machinery as they get to buy and mill it soon after.
The machine is dubbed the 'Kamatha' as it does all the work of the
traditional manual cutting and threshing formerly often using oxen.
A kilo of rice- kekulu- ranges from around Rs 40 up. Of course no stones or
weevils.
In comparison, a kilo of wheat flour is over Rs 100 and no one misses it
much- many having more rice meals. At that price, no one ever dilutes haal
piti appa or indi aappa! 100% haal!
Ah and rotti and pittu too with some lunu miris.
Though I love that fresh spongy wheat floour bunnis with a sour plantain, or
more modernly the crusty sugared kimbula bunnis or gnana katha ! ( Will be
seeing ya at Mihintale this weekend!)
The govt. does gives a large subsidy as fertilser.
With this set up, it is profitable to farm paddy unlike decades ago when the
poor got their measure of free rice from Burma and Thailand making farming a
losing venture.
Then we also depended on subsidized wheat flour from America under that
famous-infamous- Pl 480 scheme.
Recalling the 1940s the inimitable Lakshmi Bhai sang the satire;
' herali bathala tika nupurudu amma, rata haale buth kaala.... kiri nethi
hinda rata kiri deela."
jksw
The rural peasantry which harvested the paddy manually is now unemployed.
PGV
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