The drying performance of industrial inclined bed dryer (IBD) and the milling quality of dried paddy was evaluated and compared in two main granary areas of Muda Agricultural Development Authority (MADA) and Integrated Agricultural Development Areas (IADA KETARA). A mix of MARDI’s paddy variety (MR 220 CL2 and MR 219) was used and the study on both granary area of MADA and IADA KETARA were carried out in local paddy mills located at Yan, Kedah and Besut, Terengganu respectively. The results indicated that the average drying rate in MADA was 119.93 kg water removed/hr whereas only 73.67 kg water removed/hr was recorded in IADA KETARA. Therefore, normalized water removal value of paddy mill in MADA was found higher than paddy mill in IADA KETARA. In terms of milling quality, average percentage of head rice yield of paddy mill in MADA and IADA KETARA was 76.89% and 73.87% respectively. The milling quality analysis of rice resulted from ANOVA found that there was no significant difference in the HRY and total broken between IBDs in both locations.
Fertilizer-drawn forward osmosis (FDFO) is a potential alternative to recover and reuse water and nutrients from agricultural wastewater, such as palm oil mill effluent that consists of 95% water and is rich in nutrients. This study investigated the potential of commercial fertilizers as draw solution (DS) in FDFO to treat anaerobic palm oil mill effluent (An-POME). The process parameters affecting FO were studied and optimized, which were then applied to fertilizer selection based on FO performance and fouling propensity. Six commonly used fertilizers were screened and assessed in terms of pure water flux (Jw) and reverse salt flux (JS). Ammonium sulfate ((NH4)2SO4), mono-ammonium phosphate (MAP), and potassium chloride (KCl) were further evaluated with An-POME. MAP showed the best performance against An-POME, with a high average water flux, low flux decline, the highest performance ratio (PR), and highest water recovery of 5.9% for a 4-h operation. In a 24-h fouling run, the average flux decline and water recovered were 84% and 15%, respectively. Both hydraulic flushing and osmotic backwashing cleaning were able to effectively restore the water flux. The results demonstrated that FDFO using commercial fertilizers has the potential for the treatment of An-POME for water recovery. Nevertheless, further investigation is needed to address challenges such as JS and the dilution factor of DS for direct use of fertigation.