This is the second part of our series on post-harvest losses. Read the first part here.
Rice
Nigeria loses 20 to 40 per cent of its rice at harvest points and market stages. Beyond food wastage, postharvest losses along the rice value chain also come with implications for climate change, accounting for emissions of around 0.65 million tonnes of CO2 eq, into the atmosphere.
For Victoria Nwachukwu, a 53-year-old farmer based in Onicha Local Government Area in Ebonyi, one of Nigeria’s biggest rice-producing states, poor roads and lack of market access are the top factors behind postharvest losses in rice in her community.
“Many people may come to the state looking for rice, but they cannot enter communities like ours because of bad roads,” she told PREMIUM TIMES.
“If you consider the money you will pay to move these goods out to the market, it may exceed the profits you are to make from the sales. So, bad road infrastructure and access to the market are major…