Agricultural Handbook 66

The Commercial Storage of Fruits, Vegetables, and Florist and Nursery Stocks

A re-revised draft of the new Agriculture Handbook 66 is now available. The document is an electronic draft of a forthcoming publication that is three times longer than its predecessor published in 1986. One of the book's major highlights is a listing of 138 "Commodity Summaries" that include postharvest storage and handling requirements for various fruits, vegetables, nuts, flowers, and ornamentals. The review draft includes information on quality characteristics, maturity indices, grading, pre-cooling, retail display, ethylene production and sensitivity, respiration rates, food safety, postharvest pathology, nutrition and more.

The draft version of HB-66 provides information collected from over 90 authors, compiled into 15 chapters under the "Postharvest Biology and Technology" heading and four subheadings under "Commodity Summaries." While the information in the review draft has been peer-reviewed and edited for scientific content, the PQSL is making the electronic draft available for comment before publishing the final version. ARS - the chief scientific research agency of the USDA - expects to publish the revised HB-66 in print and electronically in 2005.

The new HB-66 draft was scientifically edited by Dr. Ken Gross with assistance from Dr. Chien Yi Wang of the USDA/ARS, Produce Quality and Safety Laboratory and Dr. Mikal Saltveit of the Department of Vegetable Crops, University of California, Davis, CA.