Estimating Environmental and Economic Impacts of Hermetic Bag Storage Technology

Hermetic bag storage is a growing innovative technology that can effectively mitigate insect activity in stored grain and preserve quality without pesticides. This study aimed to estimate the environmental and economic impacts of hermetic storage bags as the basis for the sustainable adoption of the technology. This study demonstrated an approach to estimate the environmental impact of using hermetic bags and their superior economic benefits for storing maize at the 1-ton scale over three years. The life cycle assessment (LCA) of six commercially available hermetic bags (AgroZ®, GrainPro, Storezo, ZeroFly®, Elite, and PICS™) from cradle to grave was evaluated and compared using the Sustainable Minds LCA software. The gas barrier liners were analyzed for structure and polymer composition using confocal microscopy and Raman spectroscopy. The results showed that bag manufacturing had the highest environmental impact contribution, with 84.6% to 90.8% of the total impacts (mPt). The carbon footprint contribution of the total service life delivered for one hermetic bag ranged from 1.1 to 1.7 kg CO2eq. The economic benefits of using hermetic bags were calculated and compared with traditional storage bag methods for one smallholder farmer using ten (10) hermetic bags storing 100 kg/bag (1 ton) of maize. The results found that using hermetic bags exhibited the highest profit of 1130 USD when used for nine months over three years, while storage loss was maintained at less than 1%.