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Abstract
Ripening of banana is the major economical concern during the post-harvest which improves the colour, softness, and characteristic aroma of banana and makes them ripened rapidly and palatable as well as more attractive to the consumer. People consume banana fruit ripened with hazardous chemicals like calcium carbide which pose great health risk to the population. Therefore, the present study was carried out to compare the effect of calcium carbide and biological ripening agent on the physical and chemical properties of banana. Treatments included (i) calcium carbide (ii) apple (iii) avocado (iv) oil palm fruits (v) pawpaw), (vi) pear (Pyrus sp) (vii) tomato, (viii) control (open air), (ix) control (bag) and (x) unripe banana. Hands of banana containing 10 fingers for each treatment were placed with calcium carbide and the other biological ripening agents in different black polythene bags which was tied up and placed on a table in the laboratory. The experiment was arranged in a completely randomized design in three replications. All sample were monitored for the changes in softness to indicate ripening. Result showed that there was significant differences among the ripening agents in both physical and chemical properties except in pulp percentage. Calcium carbide was earliest in days (5) to 100% ripening but was comparable to most of the biological ripening agent (5.33days). However, calcium carbide ripened banana had pulp to peel ratio of 1.80 while pear (Pyrus), apple, avocado and tomato had 1.99, 1.57, 1.53, 1.62 respectively. Calcium carbide ripened banana had the lowest percentage of ash fat and protein compared to biological ripening agents. Also, calcium carbide ripened banana also had the highest level of zinc, copper, manganese and lead compared to biological ripening agents. Thus biological ripening agents like apple, tomato and pear (Pyrus) should be adopted as ripening agent to avoid possible health risks from calcium carbide
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