Umoya Dryers

Industry

On-farm Processing

Year

2017 - Current

Location

Johannesburg, South Africa

Links

Umoya Dryers are designed to meet the needs of farmers large or small in solutions optimised for investment size and operating costs. The Polycarbonate tunnel structure is robust and creates a clean process environment. For heating, we use the sun to avoid high electricity costs. The process is monitored and controlled by sensors and fans.

Many crops can be converted to high-value products on the farm while simplifying challenges with quality, transport, and market access.

Drying is an FAO recommended food preservation method and has many benefits:

Increasing shelf life of high-value crops
Simplifying storage and transport of harvests
Method of capturing value when the fresh market declines
Capitalise on seasonal overproduction
A means to make high value products and ingredients for new customers
Decreases on-farm wastage

Umoya Dryers

Harnessing the power of the sun to unlock the potential of farms.

While we produce a standard range of dryers, we take local site- and crop- specific opportunities and restrictions into consideration. This can lead to custom designed dryers integrated to existing structures, specific solutions of power supply and drying tray materials and configurations.

Sizes and capacities range from a 3m2 / 10kg capacity dryers suitable for small holders to commercial farms dryers with up to 50m2 / 1t capacity.

The following diagram shows the main elements of the dryer design and options for tailoring solutions from receiving fresh raw material and wet processing, through drying and control to dry preparation and packing.