Cotton Harvesting, Post-harvest Handling and Storage

The percentage of world cotton production harvested by machines was around 30% in 2013–2014 and has remained stable over the last 15 years. With rising labour costs and a scarcity of labour, mechanization has gained traction in the Ethiopian cotton sector. The selection of appropriate mechanical harvesting systems is critical during machine harvesting. Cotton pickers and strippers are the two mechanical harvesting systems that are available. Strippers were developed as a cost-effective alternative to pickers for harvesting relatively low yielding cotton with closed or “storm resistant” boll types. Strippers use a non-selective harvesting mechanism that removes almost all of the material from the plants during harvest. Pickers employ a more selective harvesting mechanism that removes seed cotton only from well-opened bolls with minimal amounts of undesirable vegetative material. Ginning is the next step after harvesting. Saw gins produce about 85% of the world’s cotton. Saw and roller ginning are available in Ethiopia, but custom ginning is not. Cotton can be harvested using a spindle picker or a brush-roll stripper. This chapter attempts to discuss the raw material, mechanical, and economic factors that influence a grower’s decision to use picker or stripper harvesting machines. The evolution of each machine system will be discussed. A basic description of how the harvesting units on each machine work will be presented, as well as an operational description of the ancillary equipment used onboard the harvesters to convey, clean, and package seed cotton for infield storage.