Effect of vacuum and modified atmosphere packaging on vase life of narcissus cut flowers
Farid Moradinezhad, Nasim Safari, Seedeh Fatemeh Nazari
Abstracts of 7th International Postharvest Symposium 2012 (IPS2012). 25-29 June, 2012. Putra World Trade Centre (PWTC), Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. 238 pages.
2012
บทคัดย่อ
Narcissus is one of the most popular cut flowers in the world and also particularly in Birjand, capital of southern Khorassan province, Iran. The effect of vacuum packaging or modified atmosphere packaging (MAP) was studied on vase life and quality of N. tazetta. Flowers were harvested at commercial maturity stage (florets closed fully) early in the morning, placed in low density polyethylene bags and vacuum packaging or modified atmosphere packaging by injection of N2 or CO2 gases was created (0.04% CO2/18% O2 and 98% CO2/2% O2) and subsequently bags were tightly sealed and stored at 3 ± 1 °C for 10 days. The control stems were placed in polyethylene bags slightly open and stored under the common air components conditions (0.04% CO2/21% O2) at cold storage. Thereafter, they were unpacked, re-cutting prior to placing them in distilled water and stored at cold storage to assess quality, vase life, weight loss and amount of absorbed solution by the flower. Percentage of weight loss was lower in flowers that were packed in moderate vacuum atmosphere or in MAP with high CO2 concentration compared to the control after 10 days storage at 4 0c. The maximum number of days taken for vase life was recorded in flowers that were packed in MAP with high CO2 (98%) and low O2 (2%) concentrations (16.5), followed by vacuum condition (15). The minimum vase life was obtained in control (3.5). The results suggest that MAP with high CO2 or vacuum packaging have a noticeable potential to extend vase life of N. tazetta cut flowers in cold storage for domestic and export markets.