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Crops drying to a safe moisture content and handling: challenges facing African countries.
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Transcript of Crops drying to a safe moisture content and handling: challenges facing African countries.
Crops drying to a safe moisture content and
handling: Challenges facing African countries
Gbemenou Joselin Benoit Gnonlonfin, PhDINRAB-BENIN/Independent Consultant
About the author• Gbemenou Joselin Benoit Gnonlonfin hold a PhD degree in Food safety from the Department of Veterinary Disease
Biology, Faculty of Life Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Denmark. • His PhD studies were about aflatoxin contamination of Cassava chips and Manihot esculenta Crantz autodefence
mechanism. • He is Member of Codex African Experts Committee of Food Additives and Food Contaminants.• He is Member of the Mycotoxicology Society of Nigeria with registration No 145• He is Member of the committee of African Society of Mycotoxicology• From 2000 till date he has been involved in many research activities within many disciplines in collaboration with
universities, research centre and private sector in Africa, and beyond. • He has a broad research experience in that has developed advanced method of analysis of aflatoxin in modern state of
the art laboratories e.g. at South Africa Medical Research council of Cape Town (ex. PROMEC), Cape Town, South Africa. • He has performed intensive field work under rural conditions and capacity development in Africa including Benin,
Botswana, Burundi, Cameroon, Kenya, Mali, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, Malawi, Nigeria, Senegal, The Gambia, Zambia, etc.
• He has conducted many trainings in that human and institutional capacity development. • He is interesting in research and capacity development and strengthening in the field of food safety with focus on
aflatoxin • He has contributed to the science by publishing a number of papers (about 30) in peer reviewed journals covering
aspects of occurrence, control and management of aflatoxin and fumonisin, policy, advocacy and training material .
The problem• Mycotoxins/aflatoxins contamination in some agricultural food commodities seriously
impact human and animal health and reduce the commercial value of crops. • Mycotoxins are toxic secondary metabolites produced by fungi that colonize agricultural
commodities. • Pre- and postharvest contamination of aflatoxin is a major health concern in Africa where
priority crops production and consumption have increased significantly over the years.• Although, they have been efforts to reduce aflatoxin in maize through various strategies
including breeding for resistance, improved agronomic practices, cultural, harvesting and postharvest handling practices, and the use of bio-control agents.
• Proper drying and handling remain a challenge in Africa.• One of the major constraints is the inability of the small holder farmer to handle and
store food efficiently so that he/she can sell good quality produce• The standard of living in a rural community • Capacity to grow in quantity• Facilities for efficient handling, drying, storage, marketing
Traditional drying
Marketing in rural set up
Possible intervention to ensure proper drying and safety
Low cost raised platform: sun drying
High cost drying
Other low cost drying technology
•Cemented ground•Clean tarpaulin
• Mobile dryer: heated air dryer• Bubble dryer
Recommended moisture content for better storage: •Maize and other grain, 13%•Groundnut and oil seed, 8%
• Observe hygiene • Use of appropriate packaging material
Handling and storage
• Do not step on tarpaulin while spreading the produce to be dried.
• washed and disinfected tarpaulin using 10% bleach solution after the drying period or after a shift
• Make sure the tarpaulin is dried before putting the produce for drying.
• The feet of the person on top of the tarpaulin should be disinfected using 10% bleach solution and that person should remain on the tarpaulin until the spreading of the produce to be dried is completed.
• Alternatively a mixing palette could be used instead.
• Centralized government storage failed • poor quality control on incoming produce resulting in high in-storage loss rates• Low prices paid to farmers
Handling and storage
Outlook on soya project in Benin: “Improving rural soybean processors' income through processing and packaging in Benin”. www.sojagnon.org ; with finance support of PAEPARD, EU To improve soybean milk and soybean afitin (a local taste
enhancer) processing technologies produced by rural women
To investigate appropriate packaging material for long-term storage of soya milk
To ensure quality and safe soya milk
• Alternative solution to explore (not covered in the current project): • Adaptation of low cost drying and storage system: Proper drying and storage of
soya grain and process as demand arise: contamination by aflatoxin/mycotoxin may occur during storage. • Testing of appropriate packaging material that guarantee quality and safety
Recommendations• Adaptation and scaling up of raised platform for drying• Monitor drying and stop when the required moisture content is
reached• Consideration should be taking to the weather during the harvest
period• Develop solutions tailored to the local circumstances