- Floating gardens:
Our floating gardens were designed to be installed in a fishponds/household ponds. The objective of this technology was to support farmers who did not have suitable land to produce vegetables. During site selection, we interviewed a number of beneficiaries and chose 36 households among them based on their enthusiasm, feasibility of the pond to accommodate the floating garden and over all their commitments to collect and provide us with floating garden related data. Each beneficiary was responsible for collecting his/her own dataset. We had designated 1 beneficiaries for each 12 floating gardens who would gathered the data weekly from the other beneficiaries and provided the team with the data once a month. Additionally, our team used to visit the sites when necessary.
The following data were collected:
I. Name of crops
II. Sowing time
III. Seed price
IV. Germination time
V. Harvesting time
VI. Amount of harvest
VII. Market price of the harvest
VIII. Frequency of manure / pesticide (non-chemical) application
IX. Price and amount of manure/chemical
X. Maintenance cost
- Solar chimney dryer:
Solar chimney dryer sites were selected by visiting the potential sites followed by subsequent interviews with the beneficiaries. The general selection criteria were; an open space that receives the maximum sunlight time, willingness of host household to share the dryer with other households (12 household used to share one chimney dryer), enthusiasm of the group towards the new technology and necessity of such technology, beneficiaries' agricultural practices and their commitment to collect and share the technology related data with us. Each beneficiary was responsible for collecting his own data set. One designated person for each chimney dryer who would gather the data and had provided them to the team monthly. The following data were collected:
I. Name of drying item
II. Fresh weight and price of the drying item
III. Dry weight and price of dried item
IV. Drying time
V. Temperature during drying
VI. RH (%) during drying
VII. Maintenance cost
VIII. Frequency of using the technology
- CoolBot regulated cool room:
Cold room sites were selected by visiting the potential sites followed by subsequent interviews with the beneficiaries. Each site was chosen based on the necessity of the technology, agricultural practices of the beneficiaries, access to nearby market, access to maximum beneficiaries, access to electricity, host beneficiary's willingness to provide land (free of cost) for building the technology and willingness to share it with other beneficiaries (one cold room for 12 beneficiaries), commitment to take care the cool room, collect data and share with us. Each beneficiary was responsible for collecting his/her own dataset. One designated person for each cold room was gathering the data and provided the to the team monthly.
The following data were collected:
I. Name of stored crop
II. Market price before storing
III. Market price after storing
IV. Storage duration (entry and exit date)
V. Storage temp
VI. Storage RH (%)
VII. Spoilage amount
VIII. Power usage (electricity and fuel)
IX. Maintenance cost
All the collected data were finally, formatted for input into the Land Use System (LUS) for cost-benefit analysis for each technology so as to measure the economic impact of the each technology to its beneficiaries.