Introduction

When viewed across the span of the 20th century, the effect that mechanization has had on farm productivity - and on society itself - is profound. At the end of the 19th century it took, for example, 35 to 40 hours of planting and harvesting labour to produce 100 bushels of corn. A hundred years later producing the same amount of corn took only 2 hours and 45 minutes and the farmers could ride in air-conditioned comfort, listening to music while they worked. And as fewer and fewer workers were needed on farms, much of the developed world has experienced a sea-change shift from rural to metropolitan living.

Throughout most of its long history, agriculture - particularly the growing of crops - was a matter of human sweat and draft animal labour. Oxen, horses, and mules pulled plows to prepare the soil for seed and hauled wagons filled with the harvest - up to 20 percent of which went to feed the animals themselves. The rest of the chores required backbreaking manual labour: planting the seed, tilling, or cultivating, to keep down weeds, and ultimately reaping the harvest, itself a complex and hazardous task of cutting, collecting, bundling, threshing, and loading.       

From early on people with an inventive flair - perhaps deserving the title of the first engineers - developed tools to ease farming burdens. Still, even as late as the 19th century, farming and hard labour remained virtually synonymous, and productivity hadn't shifted much across the centuries.

Tractors, key factor to mechanization

At the turn of the 20th century the introduction of the internal combustion engine set the stage for dramatic changes. Right at the centre of that stage was the tractor. It's not just a figure of speech to say that tractors drove the mechanization revolution. Tractors pulled plows. They hauled loads and livestock. Perhaps most importantly, tractors towed and powered the new planters, cultivators, reapers, pickers, threshers, combine harvesters, mowers, and balers that farm equipment companies kept coming out with every season. These vehicles ultimately became so useful and resourceful that farmers took to calling them simply GPs, for general purpose.

As the century unfolded, everything about farming was changing in the now industrialized world - not the least its fundamental demographics. With machines doing most of the work, millions of farmers and farm labourers had to look elsewhere for a living - a displacement that helped fuel booms in the manufacturing and service industries, especially after World War II. It also fuelled a dramatic shift in the entire culture, as metropolitan and suburban society began to replace the rural way of life. Although some may lament the passing of the agrarian way of life, in much of the developing world these transformations represent hope. The many ways in which agriculture has been changed by engineering - from new methods for land and resource management to more efficient planting and harvesting to the development of better crop varieties - offer the potential solution to the endemic problems of food shortage and economic stagnation.

Philippines, mechanization still to come

In the Philippines, the transfer of agricultural mechanization technology has been a very slow process. The level of mechanization in the Philippines, in terms of available mechanical power in the farm is ~0.52 hp/ha. In general, the level of agricultural mechanization in the country is low as compared to other countries in Asia such as Japan and Korea which has a high level of mechanization at ~7.00 and 4.11 hp/ha, respectively.

LS AIMI mission is to alleviate the produce of our farmers in introducing LS tractor technology thus, be able to meet the demand of consumers and of a growing population.  We offer a full service that will benefit the Philippines mainly through technology transfer. LS AIMI technology for tractors starts from customer’s satisfaction and beyond it challenging the top productivity which is the core of mechanism. With the hope that the customers will not only satisfy, but also succeed, LS AIMI is strengthening the customers’ competitiveness through operator and technical training and outstanding handling of their equipment.

LS AIMI are willing to train operators locally, send technicians to the LS tractor manufacturing plant in Jenjou, Korea at no cost for anyone but us. To mechanize the Pilipino agricultural industry is essential in order to be able to compete with its neighbours and alleviate the disease of hunger in a growing population.  Our role, is not just selling a tractor.  We are bent to exist and be partners in the growth of updating and give modern engineering the solution to our farming.  LS tractors are already tested in countries like Europe and America, whose requirements are so specified and so top of the line, and now we come to the Philippines.

By Peter Jonsson LS Agri-Industrial Machineries Inc. Tacloban, Leyte

TO CONTACT US

Ms. Cristina M. Ausa

Marketing and Sales Director

REGISTERED IN THE PHILIPPINES

LS AGRI-INDUSTRIAL MACHINERIES INC.

P.O. Box 144

 Tacloban City, 6500 Leyte, Philippines

Mobile No: +63  927. 9235678   

 +63 915.3400008

Span:  +63 53 327.7497

 Tel:  +63 53 523.9288

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