Post-harvest handling technologies on marketability of maize of small-scale farmers in Nawampiti sub-county in Luuka district.

Abstract

Maize is one of the most important cereal crops in the world, in agricultural economy both as food for human beings, feed for animals and other industrial raw materials. It is one of the world's leading crops cultivated over an area of about 142 million hectares with a production of 637 million tons of grain. However, its production in terms of quality and quantity has been hampered by losses due to poor harvesting methods, post-harvest handling procedures, distribution, sales and marketing policies (World Bank et al., 2011). According to Tyler (1982), the economic importance of the factors leading to high post-harvest losses varies from commodity to commodity, season to season, and the enormous diversity of circumstances under which commodities are grown, harvested, stored, processed and marketed in this study, a cross-sectional survey in the collection of data from the 15 1 respondents in two selected perishes from Nawampiti sub-county in Luuka district the survey had two objectives including: to determine the post-harvest handling technologies and to assess farmer's perception on the effect of postharvest handling technologies of maize on farmers' income the study adopted mixed methods whereby a questionnaire survey, key informant interviews and document review were used to collect data. The da was collected from 151 respondents with 93.3 per cent response rate. The data was analyze using frequencies, percentages, means and standard deviations and regression analyses for quantitative data whereas for qualitative data, thematic analysis was used. The findings revealed: According to a regression analysis, training post-harvest handling technology was the greatest contributor to maize farmers income as the of R Square 0.298 implied that the Independent Variable (PHHT) in this model and under the conditions of this study accounted for 29.8 per cent of the variation in the Dependent Variable (Maize farmer's income). Additionally, part (b) shows the Adjusted R Square of 0. 284.So the study calls for more investment in training of farmers in post-harvest handling technologies to increase their adoption of these technologies, hence increasing farmers' income. Future studies should explore more dimensions of postharvest handling technology focusing on training and adoption and maize farmers' income a clear appreciation of the phenomena. Furthermore, research should be conducted to understand how weather conditions affect the rate of post-harvest loss in form of quality and quantity.