Critical Points of the Postharvest Chain - Part III

When we talk about a production chain, we can realize that they are not isolated events that occur, nor are they isolated companies by themselves at each stage. Each one in its proportion and sequence of events intervenes to a greater or lesser extent in the final result, there is a comparison with a link, if one is cut or does not work, the chain is interrupted and the result is not as expected. We are going to focus on this opportunity in the first stage, Harvest - Packing, to comment on some points that we believe are essential to have a successful result. If we list the main participants, we can realize that there are many responsibilities that come together, how important it is, we must understand that each one has a primary function. In harvest from how do I extract the fruit from the plant, the size of the harvest pot, how empty the fruit to the tray, the type of tray, how long the fruit remains in the orchard, the times: waiting, transit, speed and temperature of the truck, the road. It may seem like details, it can be heard silly and repetitive, it may be that we believe that we are covering all critical points, but when we talk about sensitive fruits, berries in general, nothing is closed, the result at destination marks us on fire when in the first stages we are not doing the job well. Each movement of the fruit since it is extracted from the plant, plays a fundamental role, we know that physiologically our fruit begins to literally die when it is separated from the plant, the processes of water loss and senescence accelerate, hormones are triggered and therefore each stage until the rate of respiration is lowered with temperature control is essential to be able to slow down this internal physiological process of the fruit. The how of each of these stages involves each of the participants, so the inductions for the processes are essential, who corrects and how it is evaluated. If we add large-caliber varieties to this, in berries for example, we must consider this factor as preponderant and one more so that precautions must be extreme. It is well known that lowering the temperature as soon as possible favors a better preservation of the condition, how to achieve it will depend on the operation. If we do the exercise of complying with an ok each of the critical harvest points until arrival at packing, and in packing we must wait at room temperature for several hours before entering a pre-cold, or if sanitized and the fruit is kept for a long time in the chamber, I'll be throwing away all my primary effort. That is why we say that being a chain, each link must comply and be managed to achieve a common objective of providing the best conditions to optimize and preserve the quality and condition of the fruit in the best possible way, in order to generate the moment to deligth for that consumer and let him come back for more!