Vol. 10, Special Issue 12 (2021)

Author(s):
Dr. Swetha Kodali, Dr. Lipi Das, Dr. Neelarani R, Dr. Kamalaja T, Dr. Vijaya Lakshmi V

Abstract:
Flower harvesting is a labor intensive work which requires continuous physical effort. Mostly Women are found involved in harvesting activity, especially in floral crops, who use their bare hands to pick the flowers without using any protective aids. As a result of it, they encounter many skin related allergies and pain in their fingers while and after harvesting the flowers. In view of this, the present study was carried out to evaluate the grip and pinch strength of farm women fingers before and after using ring cutter to harvest flowers. A sample of 30 farm women was selected for the study, who was involved in harvesting of chrysanthemum flowers with minimum of 10 years of work experience. The results revealed that improved ring cutter not only improved the grip and pinch strength of the fingers by reducing the discomfort and also by avoiding the injuries that were caused while harvesting flowers. Therefore, use of improved ring cutter technology in while harvesting chrysanthemum flowers has not only improved the strength, thereby increased the efficiency of the farm women worker.