ABSTRACT
Policy-making related to the postharvest technology of fresh fruits and vegetables in Egypt has not received as much attention as production focused policies. Postharvest handling of perishable crops utilizes poor practices and do not meet international quality standards. Public sector firms usually experience a broken supply/cold chains due to very poor postharvest practices resulting in the low-quality produce, which are suitable neither for export nor for local marketing. Most stakeholders in both the public and private sector along the production and supply chain, give higher priority to the quantity of produce than quality. However, quite a few private firms use modern technologies, usually imported from other countries but the training programs in these firms are provided by the foreign companies involved in exporting the produce.
Women in rural regions play a key role in agriculture. They are active partners to men in the agriculture operations, especially postharvest processes and produce handling, involving harvest, sorting, grading, trimming, packing, palletization and preparations for marketing. There is a great demand for knowledge and information on postharvest techniques among women in Egypt, as they do not enjoy the equal share with men in attending agriculture extension and training programs. In most of the cases, they are not even invited by agriculture extension authorities for relevant classes. Therefore, there exists an urgent need for training women on postharvest technical aspects and practical operations.
An innovative approach named GRACE-MENA (https://www.grace-network.net) has been initiated in Egyptian villages to assist women to become active managers of their own farms, by using information and communication technologies (ICTs) to train the women on postharvest aspects, providing them with the information and also letting them explore more knowledge. Informative and updated web-page content on all the aspects of postharvest handling, including the methods to estimate food losses, could be uploaded on the internet for women to access the information whenever needed. The GRACE-MENA project has been concluded, but a new book and a YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxyU5TE5FNRf-FvsUiE0ynA) are still in operation.
