Cooling efficiency and effectiveness of single-crate evaporative cooler for selected fresh produce

Issue Date

8-2018

Abstract

High temperature and low relative humidity (RH) promotes weight loss in fresh produce resulting in wilting, shrivelling, and browning. Refrigeration is the best way to prevent this but small farmers cannot afford it. An alternative is evaporative cooling. However, most evaporative coolers were not designed to be portable. This study used a simple evaporative cooler (EC) crate for packaging and transport of selected fresh fruits and vegetables from farm to market. The cooling efficiency of the EC using plastic crate with dimensions of 54 x 36 x 30 cm wrapped with duck cloth was 70-74%. The EC was effective in extending the shelf life of lettuce, rambutan, and bitter gourd up to 2 d. Shelf life of eggplant was extended up to 6 d. Weight loss was reduced by 66-86% for lettuce, 80% for rambutan, 68-73% for eggplant. Effect of weight loss on indices of quality deterioration (wilting, shrivelling, and browning) was established through regression and revealed shriveling of eggplant have high while wilting of lettuce have low sensitivity to weight loss. Increase in the indices of quality deterioration results to 1.50 to 1.75 decline in VQR. The critical weight loss at limit of marketability (VQR=3) for lettuce, rambutan, bitter gourd, and eggplant was 19.1, 6.2, 7.4, and 7.0%, respectively, based from the derived exponential decay of VQR with respect to weight loss.

Source or Periodical Title

Philippine Journal of Crop Science

ISSN

0115-463X

Volume

43

Issue

2

Page

47-55

Document Type

Article

College

College of Agriculture and Food Science (CAFS)

Physical Description

illustration; graphs; tables

Language

English

Subject

Lettuce; Rambutan (Fruit); Momordica charantia; Eggplant; Refrigeration;

En – AGROVOC descriptors

LETTUCES; RAMBUTANS; MOMORDICA CHARANTIA; AUBERGINES; COOLING; EVAPORATION; KEEPING QUALITY; RELATIVE HUMIDITY; REFRIGERATION

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