Vermicomposting of Food Wastes

Abstract

With the progressive increase in the size of the Myanmar's population, large volumes of organic wastes produced ali over the country are creating a serious disposal problem and a major source of environmentai poliution. In the study, effective recycling of food wastes was carried out to produce organic fertilizer vermicompost. The localiy available earthworm Red Wigglers Esenia Fetida and Indian Blue earthworm Preionyx Excavatus were used for the purpose. The characteristics of vermicompost such as nitrogen content, phosphorous content, potassium content, organic matter content, calcium and magnesium contents, pH, carbon and nitrogen ratio were determined. The vermicompost products were applied in Mustard Greens (Brassica Juncea var.) (Mon-hnyin) plantation and its effect on growth characters were investigated.The vermicomposting process took 3 months to produce black, light and odourless products. The results showed that vermicompost produced from mixed earthworm species gave higher yieid than those produced by single species. The analysis of vermicompost revealed that it contained sufficient amount of both primary macronutrients nitrogen (1.32%), phosphorus (0.72%), potassium (0.58%), and secondary macronutrients calcium (0.79%) and magnesium (0.32%). It was also found that Mustard Greens plants with the application of vermicompost had better growth characters in terms of numbers of leaves per plant, leave length and leave width than those plants without application of vermicompost.