iso ce sunflower seeds oil press machine in zambia

Most farmers prefer to sell their sunflower as seeds and grain rather than process it because they receive sales income immediately. But now that Mrs. Kamuwikeni is adding value to her sunflower harvest, she is making twice the money she used to make. A bag of sunflower weighing 25 kilograms is sold at 150 Zambia Kwacha (about $6.60 US).

To process sunflower into cooking oil, farmers use a grinding machine called an expeller. Because Mrs. Kamuwikeni does not have an expeller, she uses other people¡¯s expellers and pays a processing fee. She says, ¡°After extracting the oil using the expeller, the oil is not clean enough to be sold directly to the community.¡±

Another benefit is that she can collect a by-product called sunflower cake and sell this to sunflower cake vendors at 1.20 Zambia Kwacha (about $0.05 US) per kilogram. Each 25-kilogram bag of sunflower gives Mrs. Kamuwikeni 10 kilograms of sunflower cake.

Bubala Soko is the agricultural extension officer for Kalichero Agriculture Camp. He says that adding value by processing sunflower into oil can boost income for small-scale farmers. Mr. Soko explains: ¡°Sunflower is a crop that can improve income levels of farmers if farmers add value to their produce.