India, a location of modifications of different agroclimatic regions, rich in diversified horticultural flora. India being the most significant developer of fruits and second greatest producer of fruit and vegetables. But unfortunately the common Indian remains aloof from the essential requirements of vegetables & fruits. Due to which there's a huge difference between gross production and net supply.
All these is as a result of inefficient post harvest management, a substantial portion of production is lost after harvest. Post harvest losses accounts to about 25 - 30 percent30 % of production. Just to nourish the bursting people of india, maximising alone the creation and productivity will never be enough. Efficient post harvest handling and control is mere essential to make available more food (fruits) to the mankind.
Post harvest loss of fruits:
Post harvest deficits of fruits can be explained as a loss in volume or quality or both occurring after harvest and till the produce extends to to the consumers. There could be physical loss, physiological reduction or biological deficits.
- Physical loss: it occurs scheduled to harm in fruits during harvesting, handling and transportation.
- Physiological damage: it occurs scheduled to physiological procedures of respiration and transpiration. Transpirational loss of moisture results shriveled appearance of the goods.
- Biological deficits: it occurs due to macrobiological and microbiological agencies like bacterias, fungi, yeast etc.
Post harvest management practices:
Sorting or grading:
Sorting is done to be able to discard rotten, ruined, diseased, misshaped and overriped fruits before distributing illness to other healthy goods.
Grading is a form of grouping the fruits in line with the firmness, sanitation, size, weight, colour, shape and maturity.
Washing:
The produce is washed or washed to be able to remove the dirt, dust particles, insects, moulds. exemption - onion, garlic clove, okra, mushroom are not cleaned. For surface decontamination, Chlorinated water(100 ppm) works well. after this, the fruits are again cleaned with clean water.
Curing:
Curing is a way of natural wound healing process. It is a process of developing a corky part against water damage and infection.
Waxing:
It is a process of software of waxy layer on the skin of the fruits to reduce moisture damage, shrievelling and extend the safe-keeping life. Paraffin wax, carnauba wax and various resins are common types of waxes used. Waxol is a common coating material.
Pre-cooling:
The process of removal of heating from the just gathered fruits particularly during warm weather is named pre cooling. It helps in lowering the transpiration rate, respiration rate, ripening providing an easiness to transport and storage. The techniques are room cooling down, forced air cooling down, hydro air conditioning, vacuum cooling down etc.
Hot water treatment:
It is a process of eradicating or getting rid of the infectious organism on several fruits. For inactivation of infection by Phytopthora sp. In tomato and oranges, Colletotrichum in papaya, mango and crown rot in banana, dip in warm water at 50+- 2degree C for 1-2 minutes. Warm water treatment of mango results standard ripening.
Vapour heat treatment:
It is termed as an ecofriendly treatment usually applicable for berry flies largely mango. It is at first expensive and can't be used much by small and marginal farmers. Total treatment time for mangoes is roughly 195 minutes.
Regulation of ripening:
Ripening of fruits like mango, banana can be controlled or is completed in special treatment rooms with controlled temperatures with low software of ethylene. Release of ethylene occurs where fruits along with etherel alkaline solution is positioned in a closed chamber. Ripening process is postponed and extension of shelf life is performed by detatching ethylene from storage atmosphere using ethylene absorbent.
Packaging:
Packaging is a process to put together the produce into convenient systems of handling also to protect the produce during distribution, storage area and marketting. It really is a way of prolonging the safe-keeping life. For presentation padding materials should be utilized. (paper shreds, paddy straw, thermocole). Packaging of fresh produce is performed with bamboo baskets, sacks, wooden or cheap crates etc. corrugated fibre board(CFB)cartons being polar now a days for travel of fruits as they are of lighter weight and cheaper cost. Aseptic packaging, modified atmospheric packaging and controlled product packaging are some new innovations of presentation.
Transportation:
It is a stage of movement of fruits in one location to another, performed by, means of rail, truck, airplane and ship. effective transportation doesnot help when there is no proper handling. in many developed countries pallets are being used for trading of horticultural produce.
Marketting:
Fruits have a high degree of perishability so marketting problems are more in fruits. NHB(National horticultural mother board) provides good market intelligence service for horticultural products. NDDB, HOPCOM are handful of marketting organizations for benefit for growers and consumers.
Storage
The process of maintaining life operations of fruits upto a required level till it reaches the consumers staying away from market glut is called storage.
Methods:
- Refrigerated storage space - storage area of perishable commodities at the cheapest temperature without the chilling harm is refrigerated storage. it highly retards moisture reduction and spoilage by microorganisms.
- Controlled or altered storage- it is a process of modifying the atmospheric structure of air encompassing the fruits different from that of normal air. it entails decrease in O2 and elevation of CO2 concentrations.
- Hypobaric storage- it is a form of storage in which the produce is stored in partial vacuum. it is looked after to the desired low pressure by vacuum pump. It is limited to quality value crops.
- Zero energy cool chamber- this zero energy cool chamber works on the basic principle of evaporative cooling using locally available materials like brick, fine sand and bamboo. when compared with encompassing atmosphere the temperatures in the chamber is less.
Conclusion :
Post harvest damage is even more serious than that of production loss. It really is impossible to refuse from complete safeguard of post harvest deficits but it could be minimized to some extent by following a few of the modern cultural, harvesting, handling, marketting and handling techniques. Thus it must be kept in mind that operationalization of better post harvest technologies must be intensively developed in our country through technology refinement, professional liasion so that we don't face any profitable losses and folks can acquire nutrition from fruits to the most, according to requirements.
References. :
Name of the books - 1. Post harvest management of horticultural plants. - Edited by M. A. MIR, G. M. BEIGH, HAFIZA AHSAN QUAZI NISSAR AHMAD, H. R. NAIK, A. H. RATHER.
2. Basic principles of horticulture. Editor - K. V Peter. Section no. 11. Post harvest management of vegetables & fruits, webpage no 497-506.
- Champ, b. r, highley, E and Johnson, G. I 1993. Post harvest handling of tropical fruits. proceedings of International discussion performed at Chiang mai, Thailand 19-13 july 1993.
- Mitra, S. K. 1997. postharvest physiology and storage space of tropical and subtropical fruits CAB international new york.
- Salunkhe, D. K and Desai, B. B 1984 post harvest biotechnology of fruits. Vol1 & 2. CRC press, florida.
- Rao, S. D. V 2004 pre safe-keeping treatment for minimisation of post harvest losses in fruits. training manual on minimisation of post harvest losses in fruits organised by IIHR, bangalore.
