Gamma Irradiator Facilities for Processing Plant Industries Products

Abstract

Indonesia is rich in diversity of agroindustrial products. Yet the tropical climate causes agroindustrial products being easily damaged. Techniques for food preservation have been widely known such as drying, cooling or freezing, canning, chemical use and others. To complement these techniques, a promising unconservative technique using ionizing radiation can be safely used to preserve food, without leaving residual radiation or hazardous chemical residues. Unfortunately in Indonesia, the irradiation technique was still not common since few industries have used this technique. Compared to the neighbouring countries, only Indonesia as a big country had no interest in developing irradiator technology. To introduce this technique to the public, especially investors, BATAN in 2017 built a pilot project named as Iradiator Gamma Merah Putih (IGMP). It was designed with maximum activity up to 2 MCi using Cobalt-60 as radioactive sources and can serve from low to high dose. By the time, the number of agroindustrial customers, as well as their quantity to be processed, are increasing. The irradiation technique becomes an appropriate technology for Indonesian agroindustries. It is then necessary to build gamma irradiation facilities in areas that have large agricultural yields. This way can minimalize crop losses and increase the quality of the agricultural products.