Browsing by Author "Baltazari, A."
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Item Effects of pre-harvest application of hexanal formulation on losses and quality of tomato (Solanum lycopersicum Mill)(Tanzania Journal of Agricultural Sciences, 2020) Jaspa, S; Msogoya, T.; Tryphone, G.; Mtui, H .D.; Baltazari, A.; Kudra, A.; Mwatawala. M. W.The study was conducted to determine the effects of field application of enhanced freshness formulation (EFF) on pre-harvest losses and tomato quality. The parameters assessed include pest defects on fruits, marketable and percentage non-marketable fruit, fruit firmness, and fruit weight. Three popular open pollinated varieties grown in Tanzania namely, Mwanga, Rio Grande, and Tanya were used. The experiment was laid out as Completely Randomized Design in a 4 x 4 x 3 factorial arrangement. Three factors, EFF concentrations, time of EFF application prior to the harvest, and tomato variety were evaluated. EFF concentrations of 0.01, 0.02, 0.04% m/v were tested. Untreated plots were included as control. The time of application was 7, 14, 21, and 28 days prior to the harvest. The results showed that pre-harvest application of EFF at 0.01 percent reduced percent non-marketable tomato fruit of Mwanga, Rio Grande, and Tanya cultivars by 28.99, 26.98 and 37.17 percent, respectively compared with the control. Moreover, pest defects were reduced by 29.45, 24.51, and 27.45 percent for Mwanga, Rio Grande, and Tanya, respectively over the control. Furthermore, fruit firmness was increased by 7.69 N/mm2, 6.33 N/mm2 and 5.98 N/mm2 compared with the control for tomato cv. Mwanga, Rio Grande, and Tanya, respectivelyItem Optimising techniques for improving post-harvest quality of orange (Citrus sinensis (L.) Osbeck) and mango (Mangifera indica, L.) fruits in Eastern Zone Of Tanzania(Sokoine University of Agriculture, 2019) Baltazari, A.The preliminary experiment was done by using Jaffa orange variety to assess the effects of different concentrations of hexanal, calcium chloride and smoke treatment on physico- chemical quality. Jaffa orange fruits were separately (i) dipped in hexanal at 0.01%, 0.02% and 0.04% volume/voume for five minutes (ii) dipped in calcium chloride 1%, 2% and 4% weight/volume for five minutes (iii) fruits were smoked by burning 0.5 kg, 1.0 kg and 1.5 kg of dry banana leaves (iv) Untreated fruits (control). The fruits were evaluated under two storage conditions; ambient (28 ± 2 °C) and reduced temperature (18 ± 2 °C) and the data were collected at the 4th, 8th and 12th day after fruit harvest. Collected data were analysed by using R - software. Mean separation was done by using Tukey Honestly Significant Difference at p ≤ 0.05. Results of preliminary experiment showed that hexanal at 0.02% v/v and calcium chloride at 0.02% w/v and smoke treatment obtained by burning 1.0 kg of dry banana leaves were effective in maintaining physico-chemical quality of Jaffa orange. Then, hexanal 0.02% v/v, calcium chloride 2% w/v and smoke treatment obtained from burning 1.0 kg of dry banana leaves were selected and used in other objectives. The actual experiments were conducted for two consecutive seasons of 2016 and 2017 to assess the effects of hexanal, calcium chloride and smoke on physico- chemical, shelf life, nutritional quality and cost benefit analysis of two orange (Msasa and Jaffa) and two mango (Apple and Palmer) varieties. The study on post-harvest losses of these fruits along the supply chain was also conducted. Various physico-chemical parameters were assessed. Results showed that hexanal and calcium chloride significantly reduced physiological weight loss, maintained fruit firmness and increased total soluble solids of both mango and orange fruits relative to smoke treatment and the controls. Reduced temperature significantly lowered physiological weight loss over the ambient storage. Major sites of post-harvest losses were at harvest, transport, wholesale and retail stages of supply chain. Post-harvest treatments of fruits with hexanal and calcium chloride significantly increased the shelf life and reduced disease incidences relative to control and smoke treated fruits. Reduced temperature significantly increased shelf life of fruits over the ambient storage. Hexanal improved nutritional quality of the fruits followed by calcium chloride and the control. While vitamin C and total flavonoids were decreasing, total sugars and reducing sugar content increased with storage time. Further results showed that hexanal and cold storage conditions led to higher number of marketable fruits over other treatments. Smoke treatment had the lowest number of marketable fruits. Mango fruits treatment with hexanal and stored under ambient storage was the most viable post-harvest technique with positive net present value and cost benefit ratio greater than 1.0, thus, viable investments while the other post-harvest techniques had negative net present values and cost benefit ratio less than 1.0. Hexanal treatment is therefore recommended to farmers, transporters and traders for improved quality and shelf life of orange and mango fruits.