The Complete Rice Production Cycle

Generally, rice plants take about 3 to 6 months to grow from seedlings to reach maturity, mostly varying according to the environmental conditions and undergo 3 distinct growth phases, which are vegetative, reproductive and ripening.
As such, rice varieties across the world are categorized into 2 groups based on their growth duration.

Generally, rice plants take about 3 to 6 months to grow from seedlings to reach maturity, mostly varying according to the environmental conditions and undergo 3 distinct growth phases, which are vegetative, reproductive and ripening.

As such, rice varieties across the world are categorized into 2 groups based on their growth duration. There is a short-duration variety maturing in 100 to 120 days and a longer when taking about 150 days.

Let’s now take a look at how rice is grown:

1. Seed Quality Analysis & Selection

To realize the yield potential, a seed must be grown, harvested and finally processed justly. Also, healthy, good-quality seeds carry the potential of increasing the yield by 20%. Some of the benefits of using good quality seeds are:
– Decreased seeding rates
– Increased crop emergence
– The decreased need for replanting
– Vigorous early growth
– Increased resistance to pests, insects and natural diseases
– Reduced weed growth

A good seed is one which is pure, i.e. coming from single variety, uniform in size, viable and free of pathogens, insects and seed-borne diseases.

2. Land Preparation

It’s mandatory to prepare the land and render it suitable for planting seeds. The soil, before planting, should be in the best physical condition if one expects an optimum plant growth. Essentially, land preparation involves plowing, digging up or harrowing to till and leveling the soil.

3. Crop Establishment

There are two common practices for planting rice seeds. These are:
– Direct seeding: Done either by hand or machine, direct seeding involves broadcasting pre-germinated/dry seeds. Generally, dry seeds are manually planted into the soil in ecosystems that are rain-fed, while pre-germinated seeds are planted in areas with dry soil.

– Transplanting: More popular of the two, transplanting involves the transfer of pre-germinated seeds from seedbed to wet fields. Although it requires less seeds and is a particularly effective method to control weeds, it is labour intensive.

4. Water & Nutrient Management

Since rice is grown in bunded fields which are flooded for up-to 10 days prior to the harvest, it’s fairly easy to determine that rice is extremely sensitive to water shortage. Contributing to this fact is its semi-aquatic ancestry. Keep in mind the following water management tips for maximum rice yields:
– Construct field channels
– Optimum land preparation
– Leveling the soil
– Construct bunds to limit any water loss

It’s also important to keep in mind that rice plant requires different nutrition at different stages. Nutrition management is a chief component of rice production.

5. Crop Health

Globally, farmers annually lose about 35% of their crops to plant diseases and pests. Rodents, insects, viruses, weeds, etc. are arch nemesis of rice plant. It’s important for rice farmers to understand how the crops interact with the pests and avoid such conditions. Certain tips that could help are:
– Land and water management
– Hand weeding
– Herbicides
– Good cleaning of farming equipments
– Pest resistant seed varieties

6. Harvest

Harvesting involves the collection of mature rice plants. AS we’ve discussed above, rice crops generally take 100 to 150 days to mature, depending on their growth duration. To minimize grain damage and for maximum yield, it’s mandatory to involve good harvesting techniques. It can be done either manually or using a combine harvester. Harvesting includes:
– Reaping
– Threshing
– Cleaning
– Hauling
– Field drying
– Stacking
– Packaging

 

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Rice Mill Plants – Past and Current Technology in Milling

Rice is one of the most important food crop across the world that is processed in the rice milling plants with respect to the international standards keeping in mind the uniformity and the basic quality of the grain. There are different rice milling machinery and Rice Milling equipment used for the proper processing of rice and ensure its maximum processing capacity in less amount of time.

The most important productional factor considered for its processing is the use of energy. Energy is one of the demanding items and the vital source to measure the cost of the finalized finished product. For the production of rice, the energy-consuming equipment used includes blowers, elevators, motors, boilers and steam distribution, and many more. The efficiency of the product (rice) depends on the utilities maintained by the rice production mills such as electricity, air, water, labor, etc.

Many of the rice plants in India and also in the different parts of the world adhere to several procedures for rice processing such as drying of rice, cleaning of rice, milling, whitening, polishing, grading, blending, sorting and packaging. There are different types of sorters and separators used for the rice to be free from any type of dust, fungal infections, plastic granules, unwanted grain, etc. Some of them include:

Rice Huskers: These huskers remove the husk (outer covering) from the paddy rice during the processing.

Paddy Separators: It makes the brown rice more efficient.

Plano Shifters: This makes the rice more uniform and give rice proper size and grading with a high speed.

Color Sorters: These color sorters give a proper color to the rice and define its shade.

The basic structure and the process followed in the rice milling industries and rice milling plants include:
1. Quantity of Rice (In Abundance)
2. Pre – Cleaning
3. Steaming
4. Drying
5. Packaging
6. Grading and Sorting
7. Polishing
8. Removal of Husk

Initially, the basic rice cultivation process requires the complete preparation for the technological projects and the set-up of the milling plant. Many layouts, specifications, selection of appropriate milling equipments and units are planned for the efficient running of the milling industry. Further the assessment reports are also prepared keeping in mind the benefits with the selection of experienced personnel.

There are different types of methods used in the rice milling industries. In the earlier days, conventional methods were used for paddy processing using the steel hullers and the rice processing process mentioned in the above flowchart was carried out manually. This method seems to be the inefficient method as the chances or the profits to rise at a higher level often degrades. The marketing costs and the net returns tend to decrease that prevents the consumers from earning accountable outputs in time. Further, the latest and modern rice milling units make use of more efficient technology that hep them yield a large net return and the calculated costs become better for the large quantity of paddy. Roughly, we can say that capacity utilization using the modern methods is approximately 70% in comparison to the conventional methods used (approx. 45%). Rice is the staple food and is one of the man source among all the food grains

Blog Source:EzineArticles.

 

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