Drying techniques for coating of pelletized fertilizers with sodium alginate and microbial biopolymer

A coating is a protective layer that is applied to an object’s surface, which is commonly referred to as the substrate. In agroindustry, to manage the fertiliser solubility in soil, a varietyof coatings have been put to the particles. In this study, experiments were carried out to compare the drying techniques of fertilizers coated with sodium alginate and microbialbiopolymer. The pelletized organic goat dung fertilizers were coated using immersion technique. The fertilizers were first standardized to size of 6 mm×6 mm in its length and width. Then, the fertilizers were coated, crosslinked, and dried in the drying oven via two approaches, overnight drying and brief drying. To compare the effect of different thickness on microbial biopolymer, the fertilizers were coated up to 3 times to increase the thickness of the fertilizer. Results showed that there was no significant difference on the thicknesses of coating betweenthe technique of overnight drying and brief drying. Therefore, brief drying process was used to coat the fertilizers as it could save time as well as cost to produce the coated fertilizers.