Postharvest Losses in Ethiopia and Opportunities for Reduction: A Review

Agriculture is important for addressing food security problems in Ethiopia. Stimulating agricultural growth will therefore be the major instrument for increasing the income of the country in general and households in particular. Agriculture contributes to overcome the food security problem through growth that distributes its benefits as widely as possible and through food production increases by the rural poor. In order to help and to address the problem of small scale agriculture towards development into a modern production sector, strengthening the postharvest sector or system is essential. Estimates suggest that the magnitude of postharvest loss in Ethiopia was found tremendous for different cereal grains that can go as high as 30 to 50 percent. It is important to understand that postharvest losses in both quality and quantity since it is related to lost income and /or value of commodities produced and hence part of measure and primary concern to bring a food secured nations through modern agricultural production. Postharvest quantity and quality loss of cereal grains in developing countries appears to be initiated mostly at farm-level, so the potential remedies for the problem are needed at the same level. This review of postharvest cereal grains postharvest losses, contributing factors and possible mitigation remedies has been prepared focusing on Ethiopia situation that has cereal production potential and multiple suitable agro-climates. These are useful in quantifying the national magnitude of losses, the prevailing loss agents and relate the same to food security in the country. In a country where production is much lower than the national demand and is characterized by the level of post-harvest loss stated above, a great effort is needed in the area of generating technology that minimizes this loss.This could be in the form of technologies, which inhibit the growth of pests and provide proper storage facilities, appropriate packaging materials and transportation facilities required to minimize losses and increase the shelf life of the food grains. A remedial suggestion on suitable approaches to loss reduction in postharvest handling of cereal grains was reviewed

Factors Affecting Quality of Grain Stored in Ethiopian Traditional Storage Structures and Opportunities for Improvement

In Ethiopia, like in other developing countries post harvest losses, including storage losses is estimated at 5-26%. Damages or loss of grains vary generally and are a function of crop variety, pest and insects, climate, system of harvesting, system of processing, storage, handling and marketing. Interrelated factors that greatly affect quality of stored grain are grain moisture content, grain temperature, initial condition of the grain, insects and pest and molds

Design Development and Performance Evaluation of Solar Dryer for Drying Onion used as powder in Food

Solar dryer was designed and manufactured at Fadis Agricultural Research Center workshop of Oromia Agricultural Research Institute. The framework of all the parts of the dryer were built by joining perforated angle irons of 40 mm 40 mm 4 mm and 20 mm  20 mm 4 mm by means of bolts and nuts. The dryer covers 3.0 m  3.0 m area of the ground of which the 1m2 was used for drying chamber while the rest was saved for  collecting  solar radiation. The drying chamber surrounded by the collector from three sides, had five shelves positioned one on the top of another with 10 cm clearance in between. The roofs and walls of the dryer were covered with the flexible transparent plastic leaving the three sides of the solar collector open to allow air in. Preliminary tests with no load to the dryer showed that the solar collector raised the ambient air temperature of 20°C to 41°C to a warm air of 28°C to 64°C between the morning and midday. This lowered the relative humidity of air from average 26% in the morning to 5% at midday. The onion slices of 3 mm thickness, was loaded on the dryer,   at a rate of 4 kg/m2, and dried from 87.10% (w.b) initial moisture content to 9.1% (w.b) final moisture content in 10 hours. The open air-sun drying tests conducted side by side with solar drying needed an average of 20 hours to reach the same final moisture contents. The maximum drying rate of onion slices attained was 2.6 kg of water per kg of dry matter-hr. while in the open-air sun drying, the maximum drying rate was 0.82 kg of water per kg of dry matter-hr.Drying onion slices to its final moisture contents took two and three days in Natural convection solar drying (NCSD) and Open-air sun drying (OASD) of onion respectively. Drying rate coefficients ‘k’ (-1hr) of Lewis model were statistically significantly different and could be used to describe solar and open-air sun drying characteristics of solar and open-sun drying of onion slices. From economic feasibility and payback analysis of the solar dryer, the payback period was determined and was very small (1.20 months) compared to the life of the dryer, so the dryer will dry product free of cost for almost its life period of 15 years

Modification and Testing of Replaceable Drum Multi-Crop Thresher

In order to help small scale agriculture increase its contribution ensure food security, threshing operation and its subsequent loss followe

Rural Energy Sources and Energy Consumption Pattern in Selected Districts of Jimma and Illubabor Zones, South-western Ethiopia

The study looks in to identifying rural energy sources and energy consumption pattern in the selected representative rural districts and villages of Jimma and Illubabor zones. It also aims at identifying the existing cooking stoves and generates essential information for further interventions in their improvement and promotion activities. The analysis of the result indicates that the study area is characterized by covering almost the whole household energy consumption by fuel wood and very insignificant of free and renewable energy sources, such as hydro and solar energy sources. Vast majority of the rural households (more than 97%) use traditional cooking and baking stoves well known in losing fuel energy and very low level of promotion and access to improved rural energy technologies was also identified as main factor aggravating deforestation and health problems of rural families. Leaving rural inhabitants to continue on the course of the current use pattern of traditional energy sources, will have highly negative consequences for the rural economy at large, as well as the environment and the ecosystem balance. Based on results and analysis solutions for curving rural energy related problems with minimu

Quality of grain maize stored in Gombisa and sacks in selected districts of Jimma Zone, Ethiopia

Quality  of  maize grains  (Variety:  Bako Hybrid-660,  BH-660)  stored  in two storage containers (Gombisa and Sacks) for 180 days was studied in two agro ecologies: intermediate (IAE)- and lowland (LAE) of Jimma zone, Ethiopia. Crude protein, crude fat, dry matter, total carbohydrate and ash contents were influenced significantly by storage periods in Gombisa (p<0.05). Crude fat under LAE and ash under both agro-ecologies were also influenced by storage days (p<0.05). There was a significant (p<0.05) effect of storage containers on dry matter and total carbohydrates in the IAE whereas in LAE appeared insignificant (p>0.05). Grains stored in Gombisa under IAE showed significantly lower dry matter and total carbohydrate contents than in Sacks. The study showed maize grain quality deteriorations in Gombisa because of favorable moisture, relative humidity and temperature conditions for maize weevil (Sitophillus zeamais) and angoumois grain moth (Sitotroga cerealella) attacks during 180 days of storage.Keywords: Agro-ecologies, Chemical composition, Gombisa, Maize grain   quality Sac