Value added products from certain fruit species of annona fruit

Abstract

Nutritional security for the burgeoning Indian population cannot be met by focusing on the staple and major horticultural crops alone. Food security can be achieved locally not globally, considering that though there is enough food produced to supply the calorie needs of a growing global population there are 830 million people worldwide who are undernourished. There is a vast production of underutilized and underexploited minor horticultural crops which could be used as the “future crops” to supplement our nutritional needs. There is a scattered but significant production of these minor fruits which are rich in nutrient and medicinal value. But a major percent of the production is lost due to poor harvesting and postharvest handling, lack of storage and processing facilities. Hence, there is an urgent need to explore the potential for postharvest management and processing of these fruits. This piece of work delivers health obvious benefits to the society, economic potential for farmers, entrepreneurs and consumers to meet the growing global demand, retain market share and stay ahead of the rapidly emerging competition in the world market. It is quite unfortunate that the country is wasting such excellent fruits, causing economic loss to the farmers and the country. Hence a package of practices should have been started off to curtail these postharvest losses through value addition. Hence an attempt was made to produce certain value enhanced products from bullock's heart, dragon fruit and Singapore cherry employing certain processing technologies paving way for the availability of the product round the year, reducing postharvest loss and better remunerative returns to the farmers.