PAKISTAN is an agricultural country and produces more than ten million tons of fruits and vegetable annually.It is estimated that 25 per cent of fruits and vegetables go waste during harvesting, transportation, packaging and storage. If only half of the wastage could some how be avoided, Pakistan could earn Rs 200-300 million worth of foreign exchange annually through the export.

Due attention is not being paid to the production of fruits and vegetables. Efforts have been made to improve the quality of raw materials but no real effort is being made to improve the techniques of packing, grading, storage and marketing of fresh products. No scientific study seems to have been under taken to estimate the quantum and value of the wastage involved.

Punjab is the centre of production and supply of citrus fruits of high quality and grade. Its four varieties are placed into three groups as early, mid and late seasons. Area under different varieties indicates that about 86 per cent of the citrus is covered by kinoo variety followed by the musambi 10 per cent, feutral 4 per cent and blood red 1 per cent.

Pakistan is one of the largest citrus producing countries of the world. The others are the USA, Brazil, South Africa, Italy, Spain, Israel, India, China, Japan and Australia.

Export possibilities: There is great demand for Pakistani fresh fruits, particularly in the middle east and the Gulf states. Unfortunately export of fruits represents only 8 per cent of the total production while Greece, Lebanon, Morocco, Spain and Iran export 50 per cent of their fruit production.

Saudi Arabia imports annually 400,000 tons of fresh fruits, the biggest items among them being oranges, bananas and apples. Luckily these are produced in large quantities in our country and they are of excellent variety and quality but we are not able to take a modest share even in the Saudi market. Same is the case with other Middle Eastern countries. The reason is non-availability of facilities for proper grading, waxing and packaging.

Fruits and vegetables may be waxed for a variety of reasons. Commonly they are waxed to retard evaporation and transpiration losses from the tissues that lead to shrinkage. Coating is done to prevent deterioration such as decay, physiological breakdown, sprouting, aging, and colour changes. Chemicals such as fungicides, bactericide, growth regulators and senescence inhibiters may be incorporated in wax emulsion.

Wax emulsion: The technology of using wax to extend the storage life of fruits is not new. In the 12th and 13th centuries the Chinese had experimented with molten wax dips for oranges and lemons. They had found that they caused them to ferment. Then they developed a method of applying wax with brushes. They repeated this experiment with other fruits also. Nowadays waxing of citrus fruits and bananas has become common throughout the world. At least eight methods of applying wax have been developed to obtain the desired results. Waxing is recommended only for good quality products because it does not improve the quality of inferior ones. Sometimes it increases decay and deterioration resulting from defects, injury and disease of the fruit.

Application of wax emulsion: If wax emulsion is applied to fresh fruits and vegetables it leaves no residue and does not impart undesirable flavour or any bad appearance with the natural appearance of the fruits and its quality. The duration of the waxing on a fruit is a minute. Storage life of fruits and vegetables is extended by 50 to 100 per cent at room and cold storage temperature. It is economical and nonhazardous.

A wax emulsion of 6 per cent mixed with 0.5 per cent fungicide for coating the skin of fruits, extended their storage life and marketability at room temperature. It has been proved that storage life at room temperature of the following fruits and vegetable is extended after coating fungicidal wax emulsion with only 10 per cent wastage and shrinkage.

1. Apples — 32 days

2. Bananas — 20 days

3. Grapes — 12 days

4. Plums — 10 days

5. Limes Green — 12 days

6. Tomatoes — 14 days

7. Brinjals — 12 days

8. Okras — 15 days

9. Potatoes — 80 days

10. Kinoos — 30 days

11. Mangoes — 14 days

Waxing and grading plant: The first waxing and grading plant installed in the country was “Noon Fruit Industries Ltd”, which was commissioned in 1978.

In Pakistan, the shape, size and raw material used for packaging fruits differ from fruit to fruit. The most common containers are baskets, crates and boxes and small packs.The FAO suggests different layers for different fruits, which can be put on top of each other so that the bottom layer may not be crushed. The suggested layers for apples are 4/5,for oranges 7 and for mangoes 4.

In recent years, Pakistan produced excellent varieties of mangoes, banana, oranges, peaches, onion, and potatoes which are suitable for export. If devices are evolved for preservation of these commodities, there are great prospects of establishing ourselves in foreign markets.