Evaluation of the Effects of Fertilization and Drying Methods on Pre and Post Aflatoxin Infection in Maize under Busogo Climatic Conditions

The research was conducted in the years of 2020-2021 during the growing seasons such as 2021A started from September 2020 till the end of January 2021 and 2021 B started from February till end of June 2021, in Busogo sector, Musanze District, Northern Province. The purpose of this project was to assess the impact of fertilization and drying methods such as sun drying, dry shelter and kitchen drying on aflatoxin contamination in maize before and after harvesting. The area from which this project was conducted was chosen due to the availability of a lot of number of maize growers who cultivate them not only for consumption but also for trade purpose either processed or non-processed. During this study, a total of twenty-four samples were collected, examined and evaluated for aflatoxin levels in both seasons. In the season 2021A and 2021B sample collection equivalent to twelve in each season was done then dried them within 30 days by using different drying methods such as dry shelter, kitchen drying, sun drying. Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) with four treatment of fertilizer combination in four replications was used in this study and all experimental plots were planted with one maize variety (H628) purchased from Rwanda Agriculture and Animal Resources Development Board. Except samples from maize cultivated without fertilizer, level of aflatoxin infection was found to be higher 10 Parts per billion. The East African countries community standard limit of 10 parts per billion which indicate a health risk to the consumer, when comparing the three drying methods employed in this study, the kitchen drying method produced lower levels of aflatoxin (1.6 parts per billion) than the dry shelter (3.2 parts per billion) and sun drying methods (2.9 parts per billion), samples taken from the control plot (T4) stands for no fertilizer application resulted greater levels of aflatoxin with an average of 25.75 prts per billion compared to other treatments which yielded aflatoxin levels of at lower than 10 parts per billion. The use of kitchen drying can be recommended as well as mixture of both organic and inorganic fertilizers when growing maize in order to reduce the level of aflatoxin.