What is Post harvest Technology?

Causes of Post harvest losses

Fruits last a little longer but they easily rot as well.

• Yellowing – Yellowing mostly happens to leafy vegetables. For fruits yellowing is a sign of ripening and later decay.

• Wilting – This is common to leafy vegetables.

• Softening – Softening is mostly prevalent to fruits and some leafy crops.

• Transportation – Lack of transportation is one factor that causes post harvest losses.
  • Storage – Storage facilities plays a vital role for a success in vegetable endeavor.
    • Adverse weather condition – Changing weather condition greatly affects your cropping pattern.
      • Inefficiency of distribution – If your distribution channel is inefficient crop damage will be severe.Basis of Post harvest Technology

        Vegetables contains 80 – 95 water.

        • Leafy vegetable – The leaves wilt and turn yellow.
        • Fruit vegetables – Ripens eventually become over ripe.
        • Flower vegetables – The flowers opens.
        • Modified stem – Produces new buds and sprouts.
        • Leafy vegetables – Have bigger and more stomata on upper and lower surface, therefore have faster respiration and transpiration.
        • Temperature – The most critical environmental factors that influences the deterioration rate of vegetables. Decrease in temperature decreases respiration, transpirations, microbial activities and insect growth.
        • Relative humidity – The ratio or content of water vapor in the air.
        • Gases in the atmosphere – Ideal content of air is 78% Nitrogen, 21% Oxygen, and 0.03% Carbon dioxide.
        • Microorganisms and insects – Vegetables serves as food for microorganisms and insects. The more we keep away vegetables from them, the longer we can keep vegetables.
        • Influence of Environmental Condition – The quality of your vegetable at or after harvest is affected by temperature, light, rainfall and other environmental factors.
      • Temperature management – Avoid high temperature to lengthen the life span of your vegetables.
      • Relative Humidity Management – You’ve to increase the relative humidity to 85%.
      • Ensure good ventilation to dilute the concentration of ethylene – Ventilation is vital during storage and transport so that ethylene accumulation can be avoided.
      • Don’t store ripening fruits with fresh vegetables in the same room – Separate fruit vegetables from the leafy ones.
    • Handle vegetables carefully to avoid injury – Carefully handle your products with care to avoid crop injury.
      • Sort the products and separate diseased vegetables – As I explained in number 4 above, you’ve to separate the diseased and injured products to avoid contamination to ;the other crops that are good.

Tags: childhood obesity, children, connection technology childhood obesity, diets, eating disorders, obesity, overweight, Technology

Categories: Technology