CHAPTER I

THE PROBLEM

Background of the Study

Farming is the most important and most source of living in the world. During the 18 th and 19th century

immemorial, farming was than done in traditional methods until the introduction of technology

agriculture (Folnovic, 2016). There were several inventions that allowed for the mass production of

products, especially in the fields of agriculture. In 1831 one such inventions is mechanical reaper. Was

an important inventions in the history of farm innovation and a main feature of agricultural productivity.

Indeed, there are so many benefits introducing technology to the farming industry. However, there are

growing concerns that technology would soon replace human labor, which could be disadvantageous to

the small-scale farmers and famer workers who depended on manual labor for economic sustenance

(Hilltop Acres Poultry, 2017 Reid, 2011).

A mechanical reaper were invented mainly to reduced production cost, lessen harvesting time, and

ensure food security (Januarti, Junaidi, & Rosana, 2018; Praweenwongwuthi Laohwasiriwong, & Rambo,

2010; Tolentino 2016). The promotion of these technologies has greatly affected areas, their socio-

economic status, and their cultural orientation on farming (Amrullah & Astuti, 2017; Arida et al., 2015).

Mostly affected by the introduction of mechanized reaper and other farming machines for farming are

those farm laborers and farmhands who are landless and dependent on the work provided by

landowners (Shah, Khandewal, Paudel, Justice, Biggs & McDonald, 2016).

In Nepal mechanization options are already commercially available threshing (which are some of the

most labor-intensive stages of rice cultivation 1), with the adaptation of over 4,000 reapers, 650

combine harvesters and thousands of threshers in Nepal’s Terai (CSISA, 2020). These have significantly

reduced harvesting and threshing costs and reduced the drudgery and labor burden for members of
farming households especially women (Paudel et al., 2018).

The mechanical reaper impacted American agriculture life in a several ways. The ability to harvest more

led farmers to start growing more and decreased the possibility of food shortages. The ability to grow

more acres of crops further attracted people moving west in the latter half of the 19 th century. The

reaper limited the amount of people up to work in factories and other industrial fields. As the Midwest

is the most widespread agricultural harvesting in America, the invention of mechanical reapers allowed

farmers in the Midwest to specialized what they have and grow food for more people than they could

before that made their growing wheat economically profitable.

While in the Philippines, which is an agricultural country, agricultural output had decreased from 31.6

percent since 1974 to 9.65 percent in 2016 (17th Congress of the Republic of the Philippines, 2016). Most

farm workers are not landowners and agriculture continuous to employ between 25% and 67% of the

workforce ( www.agri.info,2016). To address the growing demand for increased government support,

the Department of Science Technology introduced the mechanized and transplanter reaper, assisting in

increasing their production (DOST, 2016). However, farmers are hesitant to adopt these government-

sponsored technologies out of concern of job loss or displacement of farm workers (Guilhoto,

Mendonca-de Barros, Marjotta-Maistro & Istake, 2002). The reaper is more popular than the

transplanter because it can harvest, thresh, clean, and bag harvested rice in one operation

(Praweenwongwuthi, Laohasiriwong, Rambo, 2010; Medrano, Villanueva, Tindowen, 2016).

So the researchers aims to find out the economic impact of mechanical reapers to the farmers of

barangay Camanggaan. The researchers intend to generate sustainable opportunities to improve the

economic well-being of the farmers.

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

The researchers study aim to find out the economic impact of mechanical reaper to the

farmers of barangay Camanggaan. Specifically, it sought to answer the following questions:

1. What are the benefits of using mechanical reaper?

2. Is there a disadvantages effect of using mechanical reaper?

3. How is the mechanical reaper affects the farm laborers?

4.