Machine For Processing Cassava into Starch

Fresh cassava root is the only raw material for production of Cassava Starch. Cassava is grown in almost all the states in Nigeria and Nigeria has been rated the highest producer of cassava in the world.There is high demand for cassava starch in Nigeria. It is widely used in industries such as: textile, pharmaceuticals, oil drilling, paper and packaging, gum and adhesives, chemical and household products manufacturing, battery, drinks and beverages, foods and so on.

What machines can be used to process cassava into cassava starch?

The major machine for processing cassava into starch are: Hammer Mill Grater, Starch Extractor, Sedimentation Tank, Hydraulic Press, Granulator, Flash Dryer, Packaging Machine and Weighing Machine.

Wet cassava starch is produced by traditional cassava processors either as a direct product or as a by-product resulting from cassava processing into other products such as gari, fufu e.t.c.

The basic unit operations in cassava starch production from fresh cassava roots are:

Sorting and Weighing:

The tubers are sorted to select the wholesome roots for production. The tubers are then weighed.

Peeling: The weighed cassava roots peeled manually to reduce high peeling loss associated with mechanical peelers due to irregular shape of cassava root.

Washing: Peeled root is washed with sufficient quantity of potable water to remove sand, dirt and other contaminants.

Grating: The root is grated to cassava mash.

Detoxification: The cassava mash is detoxified mechanically in a mash agitator for a certain time to eliminate the toxic hydrogen cyanide present in cassava.

Dewatering: The moisture content of the mash is reduced mechanically to about 50% to prepare for drying operation.

Granulation: The resultant cake from dewatering process is disintegrated into fine granules using hammer mill.

Drying: Granulation process is followed by drying of operation to produce cassava flour of desired quality.

Milling: The flour obtained is milled to desired particle size.

Sieving and Packaging: The flour is sieved and packaged appropriately.