This file contains the data from a survey conducted with 122 respondents, found drying maize in open air along the roads in the towns and urban centers of major maize growing areas of Kenya (Bungoma, Trans Nzoia, Uasin Gishu and Nakuru) and Nairobi. Most of them were maize traders, but there were also some farmers and a few millers. They were interviewed on the technical aspects (drying methods, equipment and labor used, volumes handled and duration) and economic aspects (cost of buying and drying maize, buying and selling price) of their maize trading and drying practices. From each participant, two maize samples were taken at the different stages in the drying process (freshly purchased maize, maize in the process of drying, and completely dried maize ready to be shipped) and the moisture content measured.
Odjo et al. (2020) reported results on the effect of different storage technologies on postharvest losses of maize. CIMMYT and its network of collaborators implemented a second part of these experiments in 2017 and 2018 to evaluate the effect of different storage storages technologies on grain and seed quality under “controlled” (i.e., managed by researchers) conditions and to assess the relationships between storage conditions, grain composition, grain damage, and grain and seed quality parameters (Odjo et al., 2021). Each experiment compared the conventional storage technology (polypropylene bag with and/or aluminum phosphide) commonly used by farmers in the area to other storage technologies (selected from hermetic metal silos, hermetic bags, recycled plastic bottle, silage plastic bags, polypropylene bag with standard lime-calcium hydroxide- polypropylene bag with micronized lime). The dataset contains data about the experiments: (1) characteristics of the site of experiments (elevation, municipality, state, type of climate); (2) storage technologies evaluated; (3) grain characteristics (type of variety-hybrid or native-, color of the maize variety evaluated) moisture content, temperature); Additionally, it consists in data collected at the beginning and the end of each experiment: (1) grain damage and number of live insects per 500 g of sample: percentage of insect-damaged grain, percentage of fungi-damaged grain, percentage of total damage, weight loss; number of live Sitophilus zeamais Motschulsky, number of live Prostephanus truncatus Horn, number of live Sitotroga cerealella Olivier); These data were published by Odjo et al. (2020), but are paired here with new data; (5) storage time (in days and months) and average climatic data during storage period (minimum and maximum temperature, minimum and maximum relative humidity already published by Odjo et al. (2020); (6) seed quality parameters: percentages of normal seedlings, abnormal seedlings, germination, non-germinated viable seeds, non-germinated non-viable seeds; (7) grain chemical and physical composition: percentages of starch, protein and oil contents; hundred kernel weight; flotation index; ether extract; fat acidity; p-coumaric acid and total ferulic acids contents; color parameters L*, a*, b* and total color difference ΔE*.
