Development aid project ‘A seed drill for Ethiopia’

As part of a development aid project, four Amazone trainees designed a seed drill for use in Ethiopia. The two mechatronic technicians Marius Bücker and Fabian Droste, the technical product designer Judith Hallmann and the mechanical engineering student Oliver Kubut immediately applied for this project. The impetus for the project had been provided by a colleague from university of the Managing Director of Amazone, Dr. Justus Dreyer. He was in charge of an OECD agricultural project in Ethiopia and asked Dreyer for assistance.

The specification required a seed drill suitable for small-scale agriculture in Ethiopia, where the soil is usually very dry and difficult to cultivate. The seed drill therefore had to be able to apply seed and fertiliser simultaneously with a working width of 2.0 m using the direct seeding method and also have a simple, low-maintenance and repair-friendly design. It was to be used to sow teff, a dwarf millet species which is the staple food in Ethiopia. However, the seed is even finer than rapeseed and this posed a further challenge for the design.

The trainees, who come from different training areas and training years, approached this task with a great deal of commitment and successfully solved the technical challenges: “A great team performance. These four trainees have developed and built a promising prototype”, said Dr. Justus Dreyer and Tim Schade, head of industrial/technical training, praising the work of the interdisciplinary development team.

The seed drill was disassembled into its individual components for shipment to Addis Ababa. One trainee will travel to Ethiopia together with an Amazone service technician to re-assemble the machine and to test it in practice at the place of use. They will then explain the machine to the users in detail and give them tips for the optimum use of the sowing technology.