The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh News : Fruit Research Station working on irradiation standards of mango

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Sunday, Sep 23, 2007
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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

Fruit Research Station working on irradiation standards of mango

Staff Reporter

Irradiation and vapour heat treatment mandatory for export

Sangareddy: A team of scientists from the Fruit Research Station (FRS) here are working on the irradiation standards for ‘Benishan’, ‘Banginpalli’ and ‘Suvarnarekha’ varieties of mango widely grown by farmers in this region.

Disclosing this to media persons here on Saturday, the head and principal scientist of the research station G. Satyanarayana Reddy said that the an FRS entomologist, along with another group from Acharya NG Ranga Agricultural University, were working at the irradiation facility of BARC in Mumbai and a report on standardisation of irradiation of mango would be ready within a year.

Irradiation and vapour heat treatment were mandatory for exporting mango to North American and European countries.

While irradiation killed germs on the outer coat, vapour treatment cleansed the pulp from microbes.

New varieties

Explaining the new initiatives taken by the FRS which had a gene pool of 470 varieties of mango, Mr. Satyanarayana Reddy said that red flesh variety of guava, a cross between ‘safed jam’ and red ‘flesh jam’ and red coloured custard apple with a few seeds were ready for release.

The FRS had been working on standardisation of prorogation techniques in its mandate crops -- mango, guava, custard apple and even root stocks of mango. FRS was also assisting CCMB in the formulation of organic pesticide extracted from Vitax leaves.

The seven-member review team headed by Deputy Director-General of Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) K.L. Chadha that visited the station on September 13 suggested expansion of the facility.

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