Abstract
Vegetable crops have an important role in food and nutrition and maintain the health of soil. India is the second-largest producer of vegetables in the world with a 16% (191.77 MT) share of global vegetable production. Every year, diseases cause postharvest losses (40–60%) in vegetable crops due to their perishable nature under field (15–20%), packaging and storage (15–20%), and transport (30–40%). Profiling, detection, and diagnosis of postharvest vegetable pathogens (diseases) are essential for better understanding of pathogen and formulation of safe management of postharvest spoilage of vegetables. The vegetable produce is spoiled by postharvest pathogens and makes them unfit for human consumption and market due to the production of mycotoxins and other potential human health risks. Genera of fungal pathogens viz. Alternaria, Aschochyta, Colletotrichum, Didymella, Phoma, Phytophthora, Pythium, Rhizoctonia, Sclerotinia, Sclerotium, and bacterial pathogens viz. Erwinia spp., Pseudomonas spp., Ralstonia solanacearum, Xanthomonas euvesictoria were recorded as postharvest pathogens on vegetable crops. Fruit rot incidence of several post-harvest pathogens viz. Alternaria solani (30%), Phytophthora infestans (15%), Rhophitulus solani (30%), Sclerotium rolfsii (30%) fruit rot and X. euvesictoria (5%) canker on tomato; Colletotrichum dematium fruit rot (20%) on chili; Phomopsis vexans (60%) fruit rot on brinjal was recorded. Didymella black rot and Colletotrichum anthracnose were recorded on fruits of bottle gourd, pumpkin, ash gourd, and watermelon. Important leguminous vegetable crops are infected by postharvest pathogens viz. Ascochyta pisi, Colletotrichum lindemuthianum (Anthracnose), Sclerotinia sclerotiorum (white rot) and Pseudomonas syringae pv. phaseolicola (blight), Sclerotinia white rot, Alternaria blight. However, Xanthomonas black rot (10%) on cabbage and Pectinovora (Erwinia) soft rot (19%) were recorded as emerging post-harvest pathogens on cauliflower.
Highlights
India is the second-largest producer of vegetables in the world after China, and shares about 16% of global vegetable production [1]
Examples of postharvest diseases arising from quiescent infections include anthracnose of various vegetables caused by Colletotrichum spp. and gray mold rot caused by Botrytis cinerea
White mold (Sclerotinia sclerotiorum) appears in warm and moist weather (>95% relative humidity) and favors fungal growth on infected pods which develops as a white, fluffy mycelial mat often with large, irregular, black-colored sclerotia, typical of S. sclerotiorum [11–13]
Summary
India is the second-largest producer of vegetables in the world after China, and shares about 16% of global vegetable production [1]. Vegetables have a significant role in enhancing farm income, Postharvest Technology - Recent Advances, New Perspectives and Applications sustainable global food as well as nutritional security. Fungicide is commonly applied for post-harvest disease control. Hot air, curing and hot-water brushing reduces disease incidence and increases the efficacy of antagonists. Biocontrol agents and botanicals may reduce the amount of fungicide frequently used in postharvest disease management. Biocontrol of postharvest diseases of vegetable crops has great potential under storage conditions and biological products/biopesticides are available in the market. The biopesticides Ecogen US (AspireTM), Azotobactor (Bio-SaveTM), and Anchor (Yield PlusTM) are involved to combine products with a low level of fungicide and salt solutions (calcium chloride or sodium bicarbonate @ 1–2%) and other food additives to improve efficacy against postharvest diseases. The postharvest application of eco-friendly control methods may be exploited to manage the disease of vegetables
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