Food and feed quality preservation
Quality preservation of stored products:
Chemical-free pest management cuts rice waste
EUREKA INOVARROZ project in Portugal. FTIC supplied ancillary storage equipment, consultancy services and monitoring equipment for an EU funded project to develop the storage of organic rice under hermetic conditions. This sustainable technology enables less weight losses caused due to insects, molds and rodents. It is an alternative to chemicals, leaving the rice clean and pesticide-free. Today this technology is applied in India and other developing countries. It has been chosen as EUREKA success story.
A Novel Approach to the Protection of Cocoa Beans by Preventing Free Fatty Acid Formation under Hermetic Storage
Cocoa is a tropical product that grows in climates characterized by hot and humid conditions but under tropical climates storage conditions, because of the high ambient humidity there is a fast degradation of the beans due to micro flora activity which cause rise in the Free Fatty Acid content. An increase in free fatty acids (FFA) content in dry cocoa beans is a significant factor that determines its quality. A storage condition for good quality cocoa beans is 6% MC, but the beans are usually between 7 & 8% MC. Therefore in this project we investigated the beans' quality preservation under hermetic conditions when the beans are at high MC. The technology is applied at the major producers of cocoa are Ghana, Indonesia and in the Ivory Coast where the means are low and the quality is preserved. This work was presented at the 10th IWCSPP in Portugal.
Hermetic and modified atmosphere storage of shelled peanuts to prevent Free Fatty Acid and aflatoxin formation.
Storing shelled peanuts in sub-tropical conditions, in order to save storage volume, is very limited due to micro flora development with the possibility of aflatoxins formation, hence fast degradation of the nuts. The development of free fatty acids (FFA), molds and aflatoxins formation was studied on shelled peanuts with 7.0% and 8.0% moisture contents stored under hermetically sealed conditions or in an atmosphere of 99% carbon dioxide and in comparison to aerobic storage at 30°±1°C for 3 months. Enriching the peanuts environment with CO₂ suppressed the development of micro flora and lipase activity resulting in high quality peanuts with low FFA content over a period of 90 days.
