Original title: Reducing Postharvest Losses during Storage of Grain Crops to Strengthen Food Security in Developing Countries
This paper reviews why cereal grains are lost during storage in developing countries. It says losses can reach 50%–60% when storage is technically inefficient, while scientific storage methods can reduce them to 1%–2%. It discusses hermetic storageStoring grain in a sealed environment., which keeps grain in a sealed environment, along with other storage technologies and how they work for different crops and places.
Imagine bringing home a bag of rice and leaving it in a container that does not protect it. The rice can be lost while it sits there, even though it was already grown and harvested. In this paper, the grain is the rice, storage is the time it sits at home, and better storage methods are the containers that help keep more of it available to eat.
In developing countries, grain is a staple food, and losses during storage mean less food reaches families and farmers earn less. Better storage could increase food availability while easing pressure on natural resources.
The abstract describes a literature review, but does not say how studies were selected or compared. It does not identify which storage technologies work best in particular places, or establish how much a specific intervention would reduce losses in practice.
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Reducing Postharvest Losses during Storage of Grain Crops to Strengthen Food Security in Developing Countries — Deepak Kumar, Prasanta Kumar Kalita — Foods — doi:10.3390/foods6010008
Abstract licence: CC BY
Explanation generated by Synthesis from the abstract — it is not the original paper.