EVALUATION OF COCOA DRYING PARAMETERS CCN 51 OF AN INTEGRATED FARM

Introduction:Cocoa is a very important crop in Ecuador, on account of the large quantities that are exported. Among the varieties grown is CCN 51, which has the highest yielding properties. Since the level of processing in terms of drying done by farmers in the area is very artisanal, it becomes necessary to seek new options for this process.Objective:To analyze the parameters for drying CCN 51 cocoa on an integral farm for its possible industrialization.Materials and Methods:The methodology applied was experimental, drying at temperatures of 45 and 60 °C in equipment with and without air flow, calculating the different drying kinetics in the 4proposed treatments.Results and Discussion:The best result among the 4 treatments tested was the one used in an air flow equipmentat 60°C, according to the Statgraphics Centurion XVIII statistical software data, where the best linear regression adjustment of R2 was 97.95% and the correlation factor 0.98, while the linear regression model that best adjusted to the drying kinetics was the square root-Y logarithmic-X in the same treatment.Conclusions:The research concluded that the drying process carried out on the CCN 51 cocoa samples from the study area at 60°C had the best results, which is favorable for possibleindustrialization.