Introduction-Enset is an indigenous crop in southern and southwestern Ethiopia, with a huge potential to provide year-round food production. Starch stored in the corm and pseudostem of the plant is the main source of energy provided by this crop. Enset was fully domesticated in Ethiopia between 10,000 and 5,000 years ago and initially farmed in a system of shifting cultivation. This long history of enset cultivation has contributed to the high withinspecies diversity. Materials and methods-This paper provides an overview of past research activities and knowledge linked to enset diversity and identifies critical research gaps, which should be addressed to improve the long-term conservation and use of this diversity. Results and discussion-Studies have identified numerous landraces across the vast ensetgrowing belt in Ethiopia, with genetic diversity in a particular area related to the extent of enset cultivation by different ethnic groups and the range of agro-ecologies to which the crop is adapted. Farmers' rich knowledge of enset, accumulated over many years, plays a significant role in the characterization and maintenance of the existing genetic diversity of this crop. Farmers differentiate landraces using morphological traits, such as plant height and pseudostem size, angle of leaf orientation, and pseudostem and leaf colour. Conclusion-Enset diversity provides resilience and food security despite challenging environmental conditions, diseases or changes in land use systems.
A large share of Ethiopia’s milk production comes from its rural areas. However, this milk does not undergo further processing into dairy products on a large scale due to lack of conventional energy sources such as electricity and gas. Hence, the country is not utilizing its milk resources to the maximum possible. In this study, the possible use of solar energy for the milk pasteurization process is investigated by using a flat plate solar collector (FPSC) with and without reflectors integrated. Reflectors added to the FPSC have augmented the incident solar radiation on the collector from 0.27–0.91 kW/m2 to 0.36–1.18 kW/m2. The thermal efficiency obtained for the FPSC with reflectors integrated is 51.8% whereas that of the collector without reflectors integrated is 46.2%. Likewise, the exergy efficiency is found to be 5.43% for the collector integrated with reflectors and 2.53% for the collector without reflectors. Also, an increase in the daily processed milk production of 18% is observed in September and 16% in November by using the solar collector with reflectors integrated. The quality of pasteurized milk is checked by using the methylene blue reduction test (MBRT) method, and it indicates a better quality of pasteurized milk when compared with raw milk. Therefore, this study shows that the use of solar energy for milk pasteurization has great potential to increase the shelf life of milk, and it can be used as an instrument to improve the quality of life of people living in rural areas.
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