Adoption of Post-Harvest Technologies and Food Security in Rwanda

To achieve food security it is not only imperative to increase farm production but also to adopt post-harvest management technologies in order to reduce food loss in terms of weight and edibility. This study sought to find out the factors that influence adoption of maize post-harvest technologies and the relationship of adoption with household food security in Kirehe District. It involved 385 maize farmers and revealed that majority of respondents (77.1%) are major adopters of cemented drying ground (90.1%) mechanical shelling machines (45%) mechanical winnowing machine and (96.8%) warehouses for storage. The study further revealed that personal factors like access to market information farming experience years of membership in a cooperative organization perceived reason of joining a cooperative are influential personal factors of adoption of maize post-harvest technologies. This adoption of post-harvest technologies was significantly associated with food security among maize smallholder farmers in kirehe District Rwanda.