Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Harvested by hand - maturity
- grade
Ø
Placed into shoulder bag
Ø
Poured into field bin or lug box
Ø
Transported to packing house
Ø
Water- or hand-unloaded
Ø
Culling
Ø
Disinfestation treatment
Ø
Sprayed with wax and fungicide
Ø
Culling
Ø
Weight/colour sorting
Ø
Hand packed into cartons
Ø
Cooled to 10-12
o
C
Ø
Loaded into shipping container
Ø
Air or sea transport to market
Fig. 5.1.
Generalized fruit-handling scheme for tropical fruit.
losses of products but do not consider the loss of quality or nutritional value
and the downgrading that may reduce the price received. Losses may be due
to mechanical injury, physiological damage or pathogens. Once a tree comes
into production, the most expensive cost is the cost of labour to harvest and
to prepare the fruit for market; that in developed countries ranges from ~30
to 80% of the total operating costs for the year. The reduction of losses in a
systematic way requires a knowledge of postharvest physiology, its applied
technical aspect, handling and the appreciation of its biological limitation,
represented as storage potential (Paull
et al.
, 1997).
