Researchers from Embrapa Food Technology made a technical visit to the National Agricultural Research Organization (NARO) and to farmers in Uganda, Africa, in March. The activity is part of a joint project, funded by MKTplace, with the aim of developing a new system to dry and store maize ears produced by maize growers in Uganda. Ugandans reap only one maize harvest per year, thus they need to store the grains harvested in suitable conditions until the next harvest. Their precarious economic conditions prevents them from acquiring commercially used steel silos, hence the need for a simpler economical solution for smallholders in the country. “Farmers in Uganda still use quite precarious wooden structures for maize storage, which contributes to the proliferation of fungi that generate mycotoxins, and to attacks by rodents, termites and other insects. The silo with improved air flow, on which we are working jointly with researchers from Uganda, should contribute to increasing the shelf life and quality of newly harvested maize ears, thus contributing to food security and potencially increasing growers' income”, asserts the Embrapa researcher Murillo Freire. The conception of the new silo to dry and store maize ears gathered efforts of a technical team composed of 18 research and development professionals from Uganda (NARO) and from Brazil (Embrapa). The equipment, which is at development stage, increases air flow in the silos, as it accelerates the drying of maize ears by aggregating zinc plates that are laid in a way to promote the “Venturi” effect with increased heat transfer, based on a model prescribed by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO/UN) without such adaptation. “We are working in the assessment of silo prototypes with different dimensions (1m, 2m, 2.5m and 3m), with the aim of reducing maize moisture content from 28% after the harvest to 14% at storage. The idea is to assess the parameters of drying of the ears through the Venturi system, aiming at higher quality maize. In the end, we will recommend the most efficient silo to farmers", states Murillo Freire, Embrapa Food Technology researcher and project co-leader. With his colleague Félix Cornejo, another Embrapa researcher, he visited a community of family farmers in Kapchorwka, 5 hours away from Kampala, capital of Uganda, where the Demonstration Unit for the new silo will be set up by 2018. The location, which is at an altitude of 4,000m, was suggested by the National Agricultural Research Organization (NARO) research and development team led by the researcher Cedric Mutyaba (see photo), based on local demands. More on the MKTplace The Agricultural Innovation Marketplace is an international initiative supported by several partner institutions, with the aim of connecting Brazilian, African, Latin American, and Caribbean specialists and institutions to jointly develop research projects for development. The MKTplace is based on a public policy dialogue involving the main African, Latin American, Caribbean, and Brazilian authorities to hold knowledge-sharing and knowledge management events and develop joint research projects for development. In 2016, only two proposals for Africa and four Latin American countries were approved. The project “Use of the Venturi effect to improve wind in maize drying silos for family farmers in Uganda” was one of them. Translation: Mariana de Lima Medeiros