Assessment of maize and beans storage insect pest in major grain markets, Morogoro-Tanzania

Abstract

Post-harvest losses for maize and beans are common storage challenges affecting Tanzania's smallholder and large-scale farmers' storage facilities. Consequently, this leads to a reduction of over 50% of harvested grain qualitatively and quantitively per year. Therefore, this experimental study was conducted at the entomological laboratory of the Sokoine University of Agriculture Tanzania, where the research was aimed to assess different common storage insect pests of beans and maize at Morogoro major markets (i.e., Kihonda, Mazimbu and Morogoro Central Market) with similar storage conditions in Morogoro municipality. The complete block design (CBD) with three experimental replications was used. Where locations (Kihonda, Mazimbu and Central market) markets were considered as experimental treatments. The results obtained show that there were no significant differences in number of insect pests (such as maize weevils and bean bruchids) identified between the Kihonda and Central markets (P > 0.05). However, there is a significant difference (P< 0.05) between Mazimbu and other markets regarding the number of insect pest multiplication resulting from the storage condition of those grains in a particular market. Nevertheless, continuous winnowing of stored grains was observed to significantly intensify the infestation of the storage pest in maize and common beans. Therefore, alternatively, to reduce insect pest infestation to maize and common beans in storage facilities, it is important to avoid constant winnowing of stored grains.