Guide to Post-Harvest Technology for Fruit Production
Post-Harvest Technology: Haven achieved a bountiful yield farmers need to invest in solid pot-harvest technology. Technology is needed to facilitate best practices in quality preservation, picking, storage, transportation. Other reasons for proper investment in the technology is loss prevention, food security, avoidance of contamination, increased shelf-life.
Groundnut cultivation
Why
Invest in Post-Harvest Technology
achieved
a bountiful yield
best
practices
quality
preservation
easy
picking,
good
storage
safe
transportation
prevention
of loss
achieve
food security
avoidance
of contamination
increased
shelf-life
Causes
of Loss
There are many causes of loss of produce before and after
harvest. Loss includes disease, biological process, post-harvest losses and
physical chemical damage. More include toxic gasses, pathogens, mechanical
risks, weather conditions.
Causes
disease
biological process
post-harvest losses
physical chemical damage
toxic gasses
pathogens
mechanical risks
weather conditions
Objective
of Post-Harvest Technology
The main objective of post-harvest technology is to
minimize loss, eliminate disease, damage and control storage temperature. Mode
of handling the produce is given good consideration include packaging or
carrying. The entire delicate process is to maintain the freshness of the
produce until it reaches the market.
Objective
minimize
loss
eliminate
disease
damage
control
storage
temperature
easy
handling
packaging
maintain
freshness
Stages
of Post-Harvest Crops
The importance of post-harvest technology determines
produce shelf life and final quality. Stages of post-harvest crops are dumping,
pre-sorting, threshing manual or machine thresh. Others are washing, cleaning,
sizing, grading and packing. Some require disease preventing treatment,
ripening and color initiation.
Stages
Dumping
pre-sorting
threshing
washing
cleaning,
sizing
grading
packing
disease
preventing treatment
ripening
and color initiation
Dumping
Dumping is a process used to clean the fruits before
pre-sorting. The technology includes immersion, wetting and dry dumping. This
effectively reduce abrasions, mechanical injury, bruising. Dust is also remove
by dry dumping method through gentle soft brushing application.
Pre-sorting
All fruits are not made equal some are misshaped others
bad density. Proper sorting enables easy handling, healthy fruit, remove bad
fruits, proper packaging and transport.
Threshing
Threshing is done manually or with a machine. Machine threshing
is more efficient offers better time good labor management. Depending on the crop
methods include trampling, flail, racks, boards, feet, hand threshing.
Washing
Some crop require washing in solution, dry cleaning and cleaning. They go through sizing, grading, sorting to separate for uniform quality and pre-shipping. Things they look for are uniformity in shape, color, size, firmness. More include insect damage, mechanical injury, maturity, disease.
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Ripening
and Disease Prevention
In some fruits ethylene is applied to stimulate ripening.
Farmers use ethylene on oranges, tomatoes, and banana. More treatment include
humidity /temperature control to achieve color initiation or ripening. Some
apply disease prevention treatment like vapor treatment to control fruit flies,
rot disease or stone weevil.
Packaging
Packaging requirements depends on the type of crop
produced. It is important to provide a hygienic way of packaging to preserve
quality and safe handling. Fresh fruits are packaged in boxes, cartons, gunny
bags, bamboo baskets and wooden boxes.
Handling
Post-harvest handling requirements are different based on
the produce. To handle apples the objective is to pick resilient apples through
sorting, packaging, transportation.
A fruit like mango involves fruit selection, color
monitoring, fruit shape, texture and firmness and type of packaging. Tomatoes in-turn
are highly perishable and requires delicate handling, transportations, short
storage.
