Post-harvest physiology induction of fruit ripening in banana harvested at different maturity stage

Banana is considered to be one of the most important cultivated tropical fruit in Malaysia which ranks next to durian in area and production. Banana also is very important commodity for developing country not only as staple commodity but also as a fundamental export commodity. In Malaysia, farmer cultivates a land with Pisang Berangan and Cavendish type. In market, physical appearance of the peel is especially important to local or export market. Consumer require consistent the banana fruit that reach destination have same maturity and ripe uniformly. The study reported here verifies post- harvest physiology induction of fruit ripening in banana harvested at different maturity stage. Main focus on this study in banana fruit that been harvested at different age of maturity been determined because the age of maturity plant also affect the rate of ripening banana neither in natural ripening or artificial ripening for Musa acuminate cv Berangan. The parameter that been considered in this study is fruit length, fruit diameter, fruit sweetness, fruit ripening index colour, fruit weight loss and fruit girth size been measured. However, neither in natural ripening or artificial ripening, the fruit been harvested according to market demand in banana industry. The advantages of this study and data is to produce uniform high quality of banana ripening at desired stage to fetch high market price for export market, thus increase farm income especially for Musa acuminate cv. Berangan.