This newly revised fourth edition of Postharvest Handling brings new and updated chapters with new knowledge and applications from postharvest research. The revised edition brings back the aspects of preharvest conditions and their effects on postharvest quality and features new chapters on the increasingly important role of transportation and logistics. It emphasizes consumers and systems thinking for postharvest chains for fresh produce. This book also explores current challenges—including oversupply, waste, food safety, lack of resources, sustainability — and best practices for systems to thrive in spite of these challenges. This unique resource provides an overview of postharvest systems and their role in food value chains and offers essential tools to monitor and control the handling process.Written by a team of experts in Postharvest Systems and Handling, this book continues to be the most practical and up-to-date resource for postharvest physiologists and technologists across the disciplines of agricultural economics, agricultural engineering, food science, and horticulture along with businesses handling fresh or minimally processed products.
Written by a diverse group of research professionals, Postharvest Decay: Control Strategies is aimed at a wide audience, including researchers involved in the study of postharvest handling of agricultural commodities, and undergraduate and graduate students researching postharvest topics. Growers, managers, and operators working at packinghouses and storage, retail, and wholesale facilities can also benefit from this book. The information in this book covers a wide range of topics related to selected fungi, such as taxonomy, infection processes, economic importance, causes of infection, the influence of pre-harvest agronomic practices and the environment, the effect of handling operations, and the strategic controls for each host-pathogen, including traditional and non-traditional alternatives.
Hypobaric Storage in Food Industry: Advances in Application and Theory presents recent examples of hypobaric storage implementation. The book covers examples including hypobaric warehouses in the United States and China; the results from extensive Chinese publications, some addressing military use; improved design of an intermodal container to reduce cost, weight, and power consumption; and a proposal to fabricate a container in China for shipping mangoes and other difficult-to-export plant commodities. In1979 the Food Technology Industrial Achievement Award was given by the Institute of Food Technologists to the Grumman Corporation and the Armour & Company-Research Center for their creation of a hypobaric transportation and storage system that extended the storage life of fresh meats and plant commodities six times greater than average. Since then, cost, experimental errors by academics, and other concerns have prevented hypobaric storage from achieving more widespread adoption. However, recent advances — particularly since 2004 — have brought hypobaric storage back into active research and development. With specific focus on issues such as condensation; insect, fungi, and bacterial contamination; and materials and methods, this work lays out hypobaric technology for readers including students of postharvest physiology, agricultural engineers, and producers and exporters of food products.
Postharvest Handling, Third Edition takes a global perspective in offering a system of measuring, monitoring, and managing produce processing to improve food quality, minimize food waste, reduce risks and uncertainties, and maximize time and resources. This unique resource provides an overview of the postharvest system and its role in the food value chain, and offers essential tools to monitor and control the handling process. It shows how to predict and combat unexpected events (e.g., spoilage), and manage the food quality and safety within a facility. Proven research methods and applications from various viewpoints are available to help you maintain high-quality produce and achieve the highest yields possible. The book also explores current challenges—including oversupply, waste, food safety, lack of resources, sustainability—and best practices for production to thrive in spite of these challenges.