Optimizing the Impacts of Process Factors on the Quality Indices of Multiple Rice (Oryza sativa L.) Varieties using Taguchi Technique
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Date
2022-05-01
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Abstract
Inconsistence in rice quality during production can hinder its consumers’ acceptability. This study investigated the impacts of process factors on the quality indices of five rice varieties using Taguchi technique. The processing factors [soaking temperature (65-75°C), soaking time (10-16 h), steaming time (20-30 min) and paddy moisture content (12-16%)] were interacted using Taguchi orthogonal array design of L9 (34). Paddy rice of FARO 44, FARO 52, FARO 60, FARO 61 and NERICA 8 were processed into polished parboiled rice using the conditions from the Taguchi interaction. The signal to noise ratio of Taguchi was used to evaluate the influence of processing conditions on the quality indices (milling recovery, head milled rice, white bellies, colour and lightness) using standard procedures. The optimum processing conditions for each rice variety was determined using composite desirability function (CDF) of numerical optimization. The impact of processing factors on the quality indices differs significantly on the rice variety. The milling recovery of the rice varieties ranges from 62.79 to 73.54%, head milled rice (59.81 to 71.63%), lightness value (22.92 -35.82), colour value (21.55 – 28.65) and white bellies (0.16 – 14.17%), respectively. However, the optimum processing conditions vary from one rice variety to the other with CDF that ranges from 0.82 - 0.96. Taguchi technique was successfully used to understand the impact of processing factors on the quality indices. The optimum processing conditions for achieving acceptable quality indices for the five rice varieties were predicted. This information would be useful in process optimization during rice processing.
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Processing factors, Quality indices, Rice varieties, Taguchi technique, Numerical optimization.