Storing fresh produce is not a task most people put too much thought or energy into — using a container and tossing it into the refrigerator will suffice. But for one farmer in Burundi, his method of storing freshly harvested tomatoes was far from ordinary.
This farmer’s method of storage was ash.
“He was extending the life of his tomatoes, claiming up to four months,” Stacy Swartz, a research and publications associate at ECHO said. “Properties in the ash help to slow down the process of ripening the tomato and the farmer was able to hold these tomatoes until a more profitable market time.”
When Swartz and the research team heard about this method, they reached out to ECHO’s Regional Impact Centers and asked if this technique was relevant enough among farmers to test. The centers responded with an overwhelming yes.
Post-harvest storage is challenging for many small-scale farmers around the world. With a lack of resources for pest control and limited access to electricity for climate control, produce has to be sold right away before it rots. If a farmer can store the produce and bring it to market when there’s less supply and increased demand, they can make a larger profit.
The research department at ECHO’s Global Demonstration and Research Farm in Florida began with literary research, finding that the storage life for tomatoes ranged from 18 days to six months. Because of this research, the team decided to set up an observation trial rather than a re-creation trial. An observation trial tests at a smaller capacity as a precautionary effort to help reduce waste.
The purpose of ECHO Florida being the first to facilitate a trial is to confirm validity before sending the information to the Impact Centers. The centers will then pass along the results to farmers so that they can be as successful as possible. A majority of the trials tested will last for more than one season.
“We try not just to validate something once, but over multiple seasons because of the variability in seasonality,” Swartz said.
Small, cardboard boxes are lined on a table, half of them filled with ash and the other half with sand, the control, with four tomatoes placed in each. Every week the team goes to open both ash and a sand box to measure variables such as the sugar content, Ph, weight, and more. Measuring specific variables such as these can help to see how far along the ripening process is with the tomato. Analyzing the ripeness of a tomato is a direct indicator of how well the sand and ash act as a means of preservation. The next week, they will open another set of boxes and take measurements again.
Tomato storage is just one example of the many trials conducted at ECHO’s Global
Demonstration and Research Farm in Florida. Another trial testing how variations in shade affect growth is also being conducted. In this trial, maize and beans are planted under three variations of shade coverage — no shade, partial shade and constant shade. This trial will analyze how well the maize and beans grow under each of these conditions. The results will be posted in ECHO Development Notes, a report which showcases research and
trial results.
The ECHO Development Notes are sent quarterly to 183 countries and are translated in more than eight languages. Missionaries, development workers and small-scale farmers use these notes and pass them along to others.
“A farmer in Asia might be practicing something that’s applicable to a farmer in West Africa, and we just need to make those connections in order to get information from one farmer to another,” Swartz said.
Through ECHO’s research and global resourcing, farmers all around the globe are learning new techniques for preventing post-harvest loss, increasing crop yields, and more. Tested and proven practices are helping farming families increase their productivity, improve their livelihoods, and know that there is indeed Hope Against Hunger!
