It is quite interesting to read through the threads here. Most people generalize India in terms of society or income. The south of India is pretty different from the northern part. The state in the video here especially is vastly different in terms of socio-economic structure from the rest. The caste discrimination is almost non-existent in the Southern part of Kerala. In the context, it won't affect your choice of life or jobs available to you. Or won't face any discrimination in day to day life. Thanks to a strong Communist/Marxist political presence.
Coming to the robot/contraption. Growing up in an environment with an average-sized coconut farm. The device is completely useless. The assembly time per tree, even if its 5 minutes, would take 5*200 trees -> 16 hours in just assembly. And this amount of trees get covered in almost 2 days of 6-hour labor in a season by manual labor. Also, coconut harvesting isn't just about plucking the coconuts, but also involves cleaning the top. Picking the right coconut to be plucked etc. In that aspect, the robot would do more harm to the farmer. Though the cost of labor is high, a serious farmer is going to convert a portion of his yield into oil, which gives a decent margin. Also, this won't be the only crop they depend on. My family had a rubber plantation along.
Labour shortage is a real issue and it isn't economically profitable for someone with about 20 trees or so. But this device under the current design solves only one problem, i.e plucking and solves it very badly.
Even in TamilNadu where there is no maoist presence, and strong right wing sentiment, poverty has diminished. poverty was because of denial of education by the british system, that favored the rich.
In terms of economy, the southern part is well off, there are few pockets of poverty. But poverty isn't as visible as rest of India https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/southern-comfort-indi...
Coming to the robot/contraption. Growing up in an environment with an average-sized coconut farm. The device is completely useless. The assembly time per tree, even if its 5 minutes, would take 5*200 trees -> 16 hours in just assembly. And this amount of trees get covered in almost 2 days of 6-hour labor in a season by manual labor. Also, coconut harvesting isn't just about plucking the coconuts, but also involves cleaning the top. Picking the right coconut to be plucked etc. In that aspect, the robot would do more harm to the farmer. Though the cost of labor is high, a serious farmer is going to convert a portion of his yield into oil, which gives a decent margin. Also, this won't be the only crop they depend on. My family had a rubber plantation along.
Labour shortage is a real issue and it isn't economically profitable for someone with about 20 trees or so. But this device under the current design solves only one problem, i.e plucking and solves it very badly.