Performance analysis of PUSA concentric onion storage structure

Introduction

Despite the country's ability to generate excess food, a significant portion of its population, around one-third, experiences severe poverty (Jatav and Mubeena, 2023) [2] and thus facing food unavailability. The main responsible factor for food unavailability is the post-harvest losses in fruits and vegetables, which is due to low capacity of food processing, (approximately 2 per cent of fruits and vegetables) (Ministry of Food Processing & Industries, 2022) lack of storage infrastructure facilities (Kumar et al., 2023) [4] , Among the vegetables; tomato, onion, and potato are the top three commodities included in consumption basket consumed by Indian households (Kishore et al., 2022) [3] . The main problem with vegetable like onion is that on production increases, their prices collapse because lack of enough modern storage capacity in the country (Majunder & Cherala, 2021) [9] . Onions (Allium cepa L. cepa) are a major source of flavoring in fresh and cooked food, and are the second most important horticultural crop after tomatoes. Onion is rich in sulfur-containing polyphenol compounds, fructo polysaccharides, and many other health promoting compounds responsible for the strong astringency flavor. Onion is also a vital source of minerals and micronutrients such as calcium and potassium as well as non-essential heavy metal such as selenium, depending on the area of cultivation. In addition to the array of nutrients compositions, onion is well endowed with some important bioactive functional constituents conferring its anti-oxidative, antiplatelet, antithrombic, antiasthmatic and antibiotic capacities. Flavonoids, specifically quercetin represents the most prevalent phytochemical in onion with its attendant health promoting effects. They are used, produced and traded worldwide. Bulb onions vary in flavor from very mild to extremely pungent when uncooked (Crowtherd et al., 2005) tasted [1] . While onions contribute significant nutritional value to the human diet and have medicinal properties. Area under onion crop is increasing day by day in district Kanpur. But farmers usually sells all the produce except leaving some portion for household use because of its perishability and unavailability of storage facility, they cannot wait for getting good price, therefore to address the issue of unavailability of storage facility, Pusa concentric onion storage structure were introduced and tested for its efficiency at farmer's field in Kanpur Nagar and Kanpur Dehat as well.

Methodology

As a part of mandatory activity of KVK On-farm trial was done to access the location specific technologies for various farming systems. An On-farm trial of KVK aims to test a new technology/variety or an idea in farmer's field, under farmer's conditions and management, by using farmer's own practice as control. The main advantage for on-farm trials is that it makes it possible to test over a large number of sites, thus it can more easily move research from description to prediction. Knowing what we want to say when the work has been completed should be a critical precondition for undertaking www.extensionjournal.com on-farm, applied research. Based on the background information that the farmers do not adopt about 70% of the available technologies and hence it becomes necessary to take up farmer participatory testing of research findings in their own farms. Apart from convincing them it is also given an opportunity to refine or modify the recommendations to suite the requirements of the farmers in a given farming situation. Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) was conducted to identify the problems faced by the farmers and based on the priority of the problems OFT was implemented. It is very clear from table 2 that technology given very good results with compare to farmers practice, physiological weight loss was more than 70.00 percent in farmers practice.

Results and Discussion

As far as rotting is concerned 7.83 percent bulb gotten rot inside the structure while it was more than double in case of farmers practice. Only about 2.00 mm size of bulb was changed inside the structure whereas, it was 4.53mm in farmers practice. Maximum weight loss occurred in 2020 in case of structure while it was maximum in 2021 in case of farmers practice. Rotting was maximum in 2020 in case of farmers practice but it was maximum in case of 2019 because of handling of technology. Since it was quite new in that particular year. Some handling issues has been observed. Change in size of bulb was also recorded highest in 2019. Overall performance of the structure was found far morebetter than farmer practice. up to some extent Table 3 envisages physiological weight loss was as high as 17.93 percent in with compared to 10.83 in technology while rotting was found less then half in technology. As far as size of bulb is concerned it was 2.33 mm shrank inside the structure while 4.83 mm shrinkage was recorded in farmers practice. In three months inside the structure colour of was turning to brown and dried up to some extent but in farmers practice the upper layer started dropping. High weight loss was observed in 2021 and 2022 because temperature was recorded highest in these years. Same has also been observed in all the parameters considered under study.

Performance of farmers practice Performance of technology

Performance of PUSA concentric storage structure Results Farmers practice of storing onion www.extensionjournal.com Data depicted in table 4 describes last year month wise performance of structure I.e. almost forty five percent less physiological weight loss was recorded inside the structure while more than 1. 5 times more rotting was observed in case of farmers practice. Size of bulb was quite reduced in farmers practice while in structure less than 1.00 mm size of bulb was reduced. Colour of skin was turning yellowish brown in but in case of farmers practice skin started drooping after turning dry and brown in colour. As per data displayed in table 5 maximum change in weight was observed in both the case because of rise of temperature. Rotting was also highest in July due to rains and humidity but in farmers practice it was 6.7 on the other hand it was as less as 2.9 in case of technology. Change in size of bulb was recorded highest in the month of July in case of structure but in farmer's practice it was found highest in the month of May. Physical appearance was changed somewhat in technology but it was changed completely in farmers practice.

Farmers practice Onion kept in storage Structure

Onion stored in storage structure in July

Onion stored in farmers practice in Julys liked the durability as after 3 years it started breaking perhaps because of its elongated shape. As far as overall acceptability is concerned it is given in fig2 38.00 percent liked it very much but in contrast 7.00 percent disliked the technology because of its costly fabrication and elongated shape which exceeds labour of putting the produce so high.

Conclusion

Onion crop being harvested during the rabi accounts for 60% of production, hits the markets from March to June. The same crop continues to meet the consumer demand till October-November every year before the kharif crop is harvested and brought to the market. Therefore, it becomes pivotal to successfully store rabi onion so as to maintain its supply in the markets. The Onion is a semi-perishable crop and 30-40% of the crop gets lost during the storage. Pusa concentric storage structure is good option for small farmers as physiological weight loss during storage is almost half as compared to farmers practice while was more than double in case of farmers practice. Only about 2.00 mm size of bulb was changed inside the structure. In case of Physical appearance Colour of skin was pale brown in case of Pusa concentric storage structure but in farmers' method it was completely dried and dropped. In fact results of the technology were good. But design of the technology was not appropriate and since it's made up of bamboo and quite elongated in shape, it was not found durable too. As far as availability is concern it's not available anywhere but can very easily be constructed by local artisan. Over all response of farmers was positive towards technology but needs some moderation. As per farmers response this can be a good options for small sellers. It is recommended to train local artisans and some moderation of design should be done to popularize the technology.

References

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