The video shows 50-year-old farmer Ganapathi Bhat of Karnataka’s Mangaluru district quickly going up a 70-foot tall areca tree sitting on his home-made machine. He has used his ingenuity to develop the machine which he calls a “tree scooter” for harvesting areca nuts at his farm. It has wheels and is powered by a small motor which takes it up and down the tree.
Bhat told Reuters news agency that he spent around Rs 40 lakh in its research and development over four years that it took him and his engineer partner to develop the machine.
He claims he has sold more than 300 of the tree scooters, which are priced at Rs 62,000.
