Preserving wheat grain quality and preventing aflatoxin accumulation during storage without pesticides using dry chain t
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RESEARCH ARTICLE
Preserving wheat grain quality and preventing aflatoxin accumulation during storage without pesticides using dry chain technology Muhammad Amir Bakhtavar 1,2 & Irfan Afzal 1 Received: 20 April 2020 / Accepted: 20 July 2020 # Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract Storage of wheat in conventional packaging materials is not safe as seeds gain moisture from surrounding air of high relative humidity which promotes growth of fungal and insect pests and loss of quality during storage. Implementing the dry chain, initial drying to low moisture content followed by storage in hermetic bags to maintain low moisture may prevent these losses without using fumigants or chemicals. Different levels of initial moisture contents (SMC), i.e., 8, 10, 12, and 14% and packaging materials, including hermetic super bags along with paper, woven polypropylene (PP), jute, and cloth bags were used as two factors for this experiment. After 4 months of storage, small variation in SMC of seed was observed in super bags while SMC increased significantly in conventional packaging materials. Higher storage losses (≈9%), grain quality losses and aflatoxin B1, B2, G1, and G2 contamination (1–2 ppb) in conventional packaging materials were linked to high seed moisture contents. Storage in hermetic bags at 8 and 10% SMC ideally preserved seed quality. In conclusion, hermetic storage of wheat at low seed moisture maintains a dry chain and prevents aflatoxin contamination and grain quality losses and offers an organic approach to avoid contamination of food grains. Keywords Dry chain . Hermetic storage . Malondialdehyde . Aflatoxins . Seed moisture contents
Introduction Globally, 50–60% losses have been recorded in cereal grains due to poor storage practices and lack of technical efficiency (Kumar and Kalita 2017). Direct and indirect losses of stored grain vary according to regions with 10% losses in temperate regions and almost 50% losses in humid tropical regions (Wijayaratne et al. 2018). Pakistan alone is facing economic losses worth 76 to 90 million USD every year due to improper storage facilities of wheat grains (FAO 2013). Increased production without minimizing the postharvest losses is not profitable as one third of total production is lost at this stage (Bradford et al. 2018). Therefore, Responsible Editor: Philippe Garrigues * Irfan Afzal [email protected] 1
Seed Physiology Lab, Department of Agronomy, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad 38040, Pakistan
2
Department of Agronomy, Muhammad Nawaz Shareef University of Agriculture, Multan 66000, Pakistan
food security in developing countries can be ensured by reducing postharvest storage losses. Farmers in developing countries mostly store their wheat produce in porous jute and polypropylene bags. Most of the farmers used these grains as seed for the next sowing season. Even if properly dried, wheat seeds stored in porous bags gained moisture, especially during monsoon season when relative humidity (RH) is higher due to excessive rains (Afz
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