Demonstration Dryer for Herbs, Fruits and Vegetables

The purpose of the Fostering Agricultural Markets Activity (FARMA) is to provide technical assistance in Bosnia Herzegovina’s (BiH) agricultural (sub) sectors through demand driven assistance aimed at improved competitiveness of BiH agricultural products. FARMA is to expand environmentally sustainable production, processing and sales of value-added agricultural products. FARMA will help BiH to accomplish several critical objectives, such as increasing agricultural competitiveness, meeting EU accession standards, reducing poverty by expanding environmentally sustainable production, and increasing sales, exports, and employment.

A number of FARMA Producer Organisations (POs) operate business activities that use or need dryers. This is particularly true in the Medical and Aromatic Plant (MAP) sector where plants need to be dried, either before being sold in bulk or prior to being processed into value added products. In the fruit business there is also an opportunity for drying to create value added products. Commercially available dryers are expensive. A number of these POs have submitted grant concept papers that included the need for drying facilities. At the present time, most dryers are imported. There is one company manufacturing locally but is producing units that are about the same price as the imported units. The purpose of this assignment is to assess the needs of various FARMA Partner Organizations (POs) for dryers and investigate the possibility of providing improved drying options in BiH by lowering the cost of dryer purchase.