Author(s):

Savita Rajput, Angad Singh Rajput and Vijay Jain

Abstract: A low cost “Zero Energy Cool Chamber (ZECC)” has been developed for storing of fruits and vegetables by using passive evaporative mechanism. This paper presents the result of a survey on the farmer’s opinion regarding the exploitation of zero energy cool chamber. The Front Line Demonstration was conducted at Janjgir–Champa district of Chhattisgarh from 2015 -2016 and it also revealed that most of the farmers sell their produce to the middlemen just after the harvest. Lack of transportation facility, shortage of energy supply and lack of investment on storage, lower price of vegetables during the harvesting season, farmers in this areas often sell their products to the middleman or in the local market at low price. They are not even able to get the return of invested money of cultivating vegetables or fruits, As a result, higher percentage of poverty level remains in farmer’s community. They demanded low cost storage system such as zero energy cool chamber also called Desi freez which doesn’t require electricity for operating to store their agricultural produces. The ZECC was evaluated for shelf life of various vegetables like Tomato, Okra, onion leaf, Brinjal, chili, Amaranthes, cabbage, under Zero energy cool chamber and ordinary room condition during the month of April. It was observed that the mean maximum temperature inside the ZECC was about 7 °C to 11°C lower than the ambient Room condition during summer. However, Relative humidity (RH) inside the cool chamber was more than the ambient Room condition. It was found that the shelf life of amaranths was increased from 2 to 4 days, 4 to 8days for chilli,1 to 3days for onion leaf, 3 to 7 days for Brinjal, 4 to 10 days for Tomato, and 2 to 4days for Okra, during hot summer season when it was kept in the ZECC as compared to ordinary room condition. It was noticed that, the physiological weight loss drastically reduced with ZECC as compared to ambient condition i.e. Tomato(23.76%), Amaranths (35.86%), Okra(12.60%),Chili (7.75), Onion leaf (37.36) Cabbage (2.35) and in Brinjal (21.35%). The ZECC also found helpful in reducing rotting of vegetables from 59.1-64.0% as compared to ambient condition.

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