Post harvest handling

 Post harvest handling

• Selection, grading and handling:  All produce which is damaged, decaying wilted or infested by insects or other pests must be discarded. Size-grading is not normally necessary for local and internal marketing. Size-grading may be needed to supply supermarkets. 
• Post-harvest treatment: It is essential to keep these commodities free from contamination by soil or decaying plant material. Do not wash them. Washing them may remove gross soil contamination, but it will also spread any decay through the whole bulk and result in heavy losses. Shading the produce and keeping it in a moist atmosphere helps to keep it cool, reduces water loss, and delays wilting and yellowing of leaves. Chemical treatments to control decay are not acceptable because they are not very effective and they leave high residue levels because of the characteristic high surface area of these products in relation to their volume.
• Packaging. For local rural markets traditional containers are likely to remain in use. It is important, however, that containers should not be too large to be carried by one person. Rough handling of heavy packages results in damage to produce. For  spinach: crisp, brittle and easily broken by rough handling; they are best packed loosely in cardboard, wooden or plastic field boxes of 5-10 kg capacity; over-packing will cause crushing of leaves and bruising and rapid discoloration of stems. 

Storage: Spinach has a very short post-harvest shelf- life, especially under ambient conditions. Even under refrigeration most remain in good condition only up to two weeks. Ideally, they should reach the consumer within two days of harvest