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Fonio husking machine

Machine for husking fonio seeds

Summary

Machine for husking fonio seeds

The fonio husking machine was invented by Sanoussi Diakité, a Senegalese mechanical engineer.{{cite web | archive-date=2012-05-02 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120502004446/http://www.kumatoo.com/sanoussi_diakite.html | url-status=dead

Fonio is a staple crop in western Africa. Because the fonio grains are so small, their brittle outer shell is difficult to remove. "For hundreds of years, African women have carried out the painstaking task of preparing fonio by pounding and threshing a grain and sand mixture with a pestle and mortar. After one hour of this tedious work, only two kilograms of fonio are available for consumption and fifteen liters of water are needed to remove the sand."{{cite web

Diakité's solution was a 50 kg device that gently abrades the surface of the seed before passing through a rotating mechanism, which removes the husks. The machine can husk 5 kg of fonio in 8 minutes.

Awards

Diakité's device is an example of appropriate technology, because of its ability to solve a significant problem in developing countries and the ease with which it can be manufactured. In 2008, Diakité's work was one of the laureates of The Tech Awards in the Health Award category.

Diakité received the Innovation Prize for Africa in 2013.

References

References

  1. (November 2025)
  2. "The Tech Museum of Innovation Announces 2008 Tech Awards Laurates {{!}} NComputing".
  3. "Innovation Prize for Africa 2013 announces winners". Venture Capital for Africa.
Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

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