Smart farms

: 20 September 2022; Hits: 1990

Hybrid solar & drier saves farm post-harvest losses

hybrid drier photo by KEMFRI

The Kenya Marine and Fisheries Institute (KEMFRI) has come up with a drier machine using wind and solar power to remove excess moisture from farm products to reduce post harvest looses.

The United Nation’s agency Food and Agricultural Organmisation says more than 40 per cent of the global farm produce goes to waste. The waste starts from the farm up to the table of the consumer.

The hybrid drier is powered by the energy harnessed from the fan-like turbine erected on a wind obstruction free area. It can also be powered by solar, which is harnessed directly from panels or indirectly heated piped water.

The heat from the piped water moves to the holding area to drive off moisture from the products. In the case of the direct power from the solar or wind, it heats up metal rods that are in the holding area to release the energy required to drive the moisture out of the products.

Technologist Raymond Rawa said farmers in the coast region are already using the machine for drying various products including fish, mangoes, all types of grains, vegetables, among others.

Harvests such as maize, beans, and wheat, are prone to aflatoxim poison if they are not dried to the recommended moisture content.

Fish, fruits and vegetables go bad in less than a week after harvesting if they are not consumed or stored in refrigerators and deep freezers.

“Solar and wind are available for more than 300 days per year in Kenya. And by any chance if there is no sun, the wind fan moves to generate the energy required to heat the metal rods of the machine for the moisture expulsion process,” Ruma said.

The turbine rotates to generate energy, which is stored in a battery before being channeled into the heating chamber.
The solar power is used in two ways, the technologist said.

The direct heat from the sun is harnessed by the panels then into a battery before being released slowly into to heat the metal rods in the drying chamber.

The second way is the sun heating solar panels and the released energy increases the temperature of the piped water in the system in a cycle to the drying chamber to drive the moisture out.

The driers are customised to meet the needs of the farmers. For the smallholders, the small drier costs between Sh150,000 and S180,000.

It dries between 20kg to 30kg in six hours; the variation in the amount depends on the type of the harvest being dried. The big or communal one costs about Sh1.8 million. This one dries about 200kg in six hours.

The wind turbine generates at least 900watts per hour and it is three phase.

Average heat output collector is 24kwhrs.

Mangos are being chopped into slices before dying and packaging for crisps, while others are ground into power for export.

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: 19 September 2022; Hits: 3914

Hanging gardens helping urbanites reduce vegetable costs

esther kimani

As rural to urban migration surges in Kenya and many parts of the world, many residents are finding it difficult to put food on the table due to the high cost of living. However, some urban residents are coming up with innovative ways to grow vegetables on scarce land in towns by embracing hanging gardens.

A hanging garden is a sustainable landscape architecture, an artistic garden or a small urban farm attached to or built on a wall. They are mainly found in areas where land is scarce or where the farmer is mobile or temporarily living.

Esther Kimani is one such farmer who has embraced the idea of hanging garden in her Nyeri town home so as to feed her family of five. When Farmbiz Africa visited demonstration stand at the Central Kenya Agricultural show at Kabiruini grounds in outskirts of Nyeri County on 16th September 2017, she was busy educating attendees on the importance of hanging gardens as a way to promote sustainable urban farming.

“At first my neighbors and family members were skeptical about the idea as they believed successful farming can only be done in rural farms with adequate space” said Esther. She however went ahead with her plans and established a hanging garden in her backyard space.

Fruit farming boon to drought hit farmers

passion

The adoption of farming different fruits in Machakos, Kitui and Makueni counties, famously known as Ukambani or Eastern Kenya region is keeping alive hopes of many farmers from the region which has for years been threatened by poor harvesting.

Most parts of the country especially eastern region for instance experienced below-normal rainfall that was mainly recorded in April and May 2017 according to the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources State Department of Environment Kenya, Meteorological Department.

This ever hotter weather and more erratic rainfall has made growing many crops more difficult in Kenya’s Ukambani region, but fruits harvest is prospering.

“We use the hot sun as a blessing,” said Meshaek Ikinya Mutera, who began farming mangoes in semi-arid Machakos County about seven years ago and has seen his harvest increase by about 40 percent in the last five years.

As per the Best Tropical Fruits Company, a Kenyan fruit growing and processing firm, between 2012 and 2016, mango production in Kenya rose by 47 percent, to more than 80,000 tonnes.

This according to the firm has also increased selling price for processed mango by two thirds since 2013, with overall revenue from mango sales hitting 400 million Kenyan shillings ($3.9 million) by the end of 2016.

The region is turning out “some of the sweetest mangoes in the world”, said the Mutera, who represents a group of mango growers and also has carried out research on mango farming in Kenya as part of a master’s degree programme.

Growing cereals especially maize and beans which the farmers would plant in April for October harvest, but the crops would not perform well due to inadequate rainfall.The end result has been, very little is produced that could hardly take care of the farmers’ families not to talk of selling.

“We would end up miserable on harvest time because we would not have enough produce to take care of our families and to sell,” recalls Beth Munuvi, a farmer in Kaulani village, Yatta Constituency.

Munuvi who grows yellow passion today says the passion is speedily raising as the fruit of choice for most farmers in the county.

“I am happy that yellow passion is picking up well giving rise to some farmers’ organizations where we can sell our produce,” says Munuvi,

She is a member of the Yatta Farm Growers Community Based Organisation, which brings together 100 farmers.

Ramesh Gorasia grows date palms on part of his 400-acre farm in Masongaleni, Makueni County. Date palms are related to loquats safe for trees.

“We have 772 mature date palms and 1,200 young ones. Our main specialty is fresh dates, which we grow for sale both locally and abroad,” says Gorasia.

In his farm there are also oranges, tangarines, grapefruits, bananas, mangoes among others.

In June this year, Governor Kivutha Kibwana, Makueni Farmers representatives, and residents of Makueni unveiled the Makueni Fruit Processing Plant at Kalamba.

The Plant has a capacity to process five metric tons of raw mangoes producing 3,000 liters of Puree (Mango concentrate) per hour. A liter of the concentrate fetches Sh150 at the market place.

This factory will provide opportunities for local farmers and investors to own a stake and grow wealth, learn new technologies and learn about value addition to increase farm incomes.

Makueni County, with a total of 1,469,625 mango trees from its 28,696 farmers, led in 2010 mango production in the Eastern province, generating Sh1.267,974. Machakos County followed with Sh300,268 from 506,544 mango trees scattered to its 17,676 farmers according to Institution Development and Management’s baseline survey of mango trees census report.

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