ศูนย์นวัตกรรมเทคโนโลยีหลังการเก็บเกี่ยว

Postharvest food losses in Ghana.

Addae, David Kwasi

Thesis (Educat.D.), West Virginia University, 1986, 181 pages

1986

บทคัดย่อ

Postharvest food losses present a major problem in developing countries, especially in Africa.  The over-alarming state of the affair compelled the United Nations General Assembly, in 1975, to set a 50 percent reduction in postharvest food losses in developing countries as an objective to be achieved by 1985.

 This study focused on Ghana, an African nation with the population of about 13 million.  The storability of perishable foods often becomes a serious problem in Ghana where climatic conditions favor insect development and deterioration of crops after harvest.

 The purpose of this study was to identify traditional storage problems (principally for corn, cassava and yams) and to recommend appropriate solutions to them.

 To achieve the goal of the study, a village was selected in the Volta Region of Ghana.  Between October and November, 1985, an on-site study was conducted, and an open-ended questionnaire administered.  Qualitative and quantitative methods were employed in analyzing and interpreting of the data.

 This study revealed that in the village studied, crop storage was mainly in the traditional facilities that had been developed hundreds of years ago.  The subsistence farmers perceived that there were several problems associated with the postharvest food losses in the sample village.  These problems were determined to be very critical from economic, social and nutritional standpoints.  It was recommended that the Ghanaian government should establish a post harvest policy body and allocate resources for reducing food losses.  The activities of the national development as well as education, training and extension services.