Improving the AEATRI-motorized maize sheller to meet the market demands of commercial maize farmers

The importance of maize (Zea mays) in Ugandan economy has been increasing since 1990’s. The crop is grown for both local and foreign markets by mainly small-scale farmers. The bulk of the crop is shelled using the rudimentary traditional methods, which have low productivity and result into maize grain of low market value. Earlier studies conducted by Agricultural Engineering and Appropriate Technology Research Institute (AEATRI) in 1995 identified lack of appropriate maize shellers to meet the market demands of commercial farmers as one of the major constraints that mitigate the increased trends of maize production in Uganda. AEATRI responded by developing a motorized maize sheller, which had a mean output of 1,100kg/hr/lt of fuel, shelling efficiency of 98.8% and mean damaged grain of 2%. The shelling unit of this model was later redesigned and fabricated to give a new model of the sheller. Comparative evaluation of shelling units of these two models was done using Longe-5 maize variety. Commercial maize farmers, extension agents and local political leaders were involved in the evaluation. The machine parameters evaluated were output in kg/hr/lt of fuel, percentage of broken grain, shelling efficiency and seed germination percentage. The new model had higher mean output (1,490kg/hr/lt of fuel) and shelling efficiency (99.7%) than the old one (p<0.5). There was inadequate evidence to show that the percentage of broken grain caused by the two models were significantly different (p>0.5). However the mean value of broken grain from the new model was 1.8% while from the old sheller stood at 2%. The mean seed germination tests were 90.8% and 90.4% for the new and old shellers respectively. The stakeholders especially farmers present during the evaluation were satisfied with the performance of the new maize sheller model. The institute has consequently recommended it for release to the private sector agro-processing equipment manufacturers for scaling up.