Postharvest Diseases of Vegetable Crops and Their Management

Vegetable crops have an important role in food and nutrition and maintain the health of soil. India is the second-largest producer of vegetables in the world with a 16% (191.77 MT) share of global vegetable production. Every year, diseases cause postharvest losses (40–60%) in vegetable crops due to their perishable nature under field (15–20%), packaging and storage (15–20%), and transport (30–40%). Profiling, detection, and diagnosis of postharvest vegetable pathogens (diseases) are essential for better understanding of pathogen and formulation of safe management of postharvest spoilage of vegetables. The vegetable produce is spoiled by postharvest pathogens and makes them unfit for human consumption and market due to the production of mycotoxins and other potential human health risks. Genera of fungal pathogens viz. Alternaria, Aschochyta, Colletotrichum, Didymella, Phoma, Phytophthora, Pythium, Rhizoctonia, Sclerotinia, Sclerotium, and bacterial pathogens viz. Erwinia spp., Pseudomonas spp., Ralstonia solanacearum, Xanthomonas euvesictoria were recorded as postharvest pathogens on vegetable crops. Fruit rot incidence of several post-harvest pathogens viz. Alternaria solani (30%), Phytophthora infestans (15%), Rhophitulus solani (30%), Sclerotium rolfsii (30%) fruit rot and X. euvesictoria (5%) canker on tomato; Colletotrichum dematium fruit rot (20%) on chili; Phomopsis vexans (60%) fruit rot on brinjal was recorded. Didymella black rot and Colletotrichum anthracnose were recorded on fruits of bottle gourd, pumpkin, ash gourd, and watermelon. Important leguminous vegetable crops are infected by postharvest pathogens viz. Ascochyta pisi, Colletotrichum lindemuthianum (Anthracnose), Sclerotinia sclerotiorum (white rot) and Pseudomonas syringae pv. phaseolicola (blight), Sclerotinia white rot, Alternaria blight. However, Xanthomonas black rot (10%) on cabbage and Pectinovora (Erwinia) soft rot (19%) were recorded as emerging post-harvest pathogens on cauliflower.