Butter production, processing and handling practices at smallholders level in the central highlands and southwest midlands of Ethiopia
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Abstract
Cross-sectional study of smallholder butter production, processing and handling practices was conducted in the
central highlands and south-western midlands of Ethiopia. Semi-structured questionnaire was pre-tested and
used for data collection and 532 respondents were purposively selected and interviewed. Statistical Package for
Social Sciences and SAS were used to analyse the data. Results show that, women were entirely responsible for
butter production and handling and the produt is mainly used for income generation, flavouring of locally made
foods and stews and hair dressing in the study areas. Amount of raw milk fermented for butter making at a time
(7.16 ± 2.43 litres), fermentation time (3.92 ± 0.71 days), churning time (2.12 ± 0.21 hours), quantity of butter
produced (0.49 ± 0.01 kg), butter sold /week (0.49 ± 0.02 kg) and butter used for different purposes (0.28 ± 0.06
kg/week) varied significantly (P< 0.05) between the sites. Local butter preservation methods include ghee
making, salting and spicing are major ones. PHL of butter occurs in the study areas due to different reasons.
Copying mechanisms to mitigate the loss includes use of umbrella to shield butter from direct sunlight and heat
while traveling to and in the local markets, storing butter for overnight in buckets of cold water before
transporting butter to local markets. Processing, storage, and packaging materials (clay pots and gourds) used for
local butter, handling and preservation practices such as spicing and salting were not optimized. Cost-effective
strategies can be applied to optimize the current practices to supply adequate, better quality and safe butter.
There is a need of dairy processing technologies and dependable marketing systems in the rural areas. It is also
vital to assure the safe production, handling and delivery of local butter by creating awareness to the smallholder
butter producers.