International Journal of Horticulture, 2025, Vol.15, No.2, 51-60 http://hortherbpublisher.com/index.php/ijh 58 compound result in “Flavor”. The higher sugar-acid ratio in T10 indicates a higher concentration of sugar than acid which correlates to higher level ripening and maturity. On the contrary, the lower TSS: acid ratio in treated tomatoes signifies that these treatments have potential anti-ripening effects (Asghari and Aghdam, 2010). pH in tomatoes progressively increases with maturation and is found to have increased with ripening (Yamaguchi, 1960). All treatments exhibited comparatively lower pH than the control however, except those treated with CaCl2 as it seemed to have little effect on the pH of tomatoes which was also in the case of a study conducted by Senevirathna and Daundasekera (2010) in tomatoes. All the concentrations of SA were able to maintain significantly lower levels of pH. Similar findings were reported by Pila et al. (2010) in tomatoes stored in ambient conditions. The concentration of ascorbic acid acts as an indicator of the fruit’s development stage and overall health. A decrease in ascorbic acid typically indicates senescence in fruit while an increase shows that the fruit is still in the ripening stage (Esteves et al., 1984).The findings of this study align with that of Pila et al. (2010) who observed the highest ascorbic acid content retention in tomato fruits treated with 0.1% GA3 and concluded all three treatments of gibberellic acid, calcium chloride, and salicylic acid were beneficial in retarding degradation of ascorbic acid content. Likewise, in the case of calcium chloride higher concentrations were more effective in the retention of ascorbic acid i.e., 1.5% CaCl2 (11.43 mg/100 g)> 1% CaCl2 (10.01 mg/100 g) > 0.5% CaCl2 (9.87 mg/100 g). Similar findings were observed by Mazumder et al. (2021) that the ascorbic acid content decreased with ripening, however, higher retention in ascorbic acid content was found in tomatoes treated with 1% to 2% CaCl2 harvested at the breaker stage after 10 days of storage duration. Such trends in tomatoes treated with CaCl2 were also observed by Chepngeno et al. (2016). The SA-treated tomatoes exhibited higher ascorbic acid content than the control, among which the highest observed in T9 (0.3 mM SA) valued at 10.36 mg/100 g. In justification of our result, Baninaiem et al. (2016) reported that SA-treated tomato fruits showed comparatively higher levels of ascorbic acid than the control set and suggested SA effectively protects the cell wall by decreasing the expression of degrading enzymes, slows down the ripening and hence reduces the degradation of ascorbic acid (concurrently with degradation of fruit tissues). The studies done by Changwal et al. (2021) also mentioned SA was found helpful in maintaining higher levels of ascorbic acid in tomatoes. Our findings on the shelf-life extension of tomatoes with the results of Pila et al. (2010) who reported that the fruits treated with 0.1% GA3, 1.5%CaCl2, and 0.4mM SA had the most significant extension of the shelf-life by 18, 17 and 15 days respectively. This can be attributed to the negative roles of GA3 in the ripening of tomatoes (Li et al., 2019; Dhami et al., 2023). Similarly, higher concentrations of CaCl2 (1% and 1.5%) resulted in tomatoes' longer shelf life as Bhattarai and Gautam (2009) reported that the higher the concentration of CaCl2, the higher the shelf-life. Moreover, fruits treated with SA did exhibit longer shelf-life days than the control, however, it wasn't as significant as other treatments. This discrepancy might be due to the concentrations of SA used to treat fruits and storage temperature, contrary to Mandal et al. (2016) who compared lower concentrations of SA (0.2, 0.4, 0.6, and 0.8 mM) with higher concentrations of SA (1 and 1.2 mM) at refrigerated conditions and found that higher concentrations of SA were significantly effective in extending the shelf life of tomatoes up to 32.75 days. Likewise, the treatment of tomatoes with 0.75 mM salicylic acid prolonged the shelf life by 7 days along with a lower weight loss percentage, and was proved to be more effective than oxalic acid (Kant et al., 2013). The use of 0.1% GA3 and 1.5% CaCl2 as a postharvest treatment could provide a cost-effective solution which are rather readily available, and simple to prepare and use for smallholder farmers in Nepal. These plant growth regulators will not only extend the tomatoes' shelf life but also provide the farmers an opportunity to negotiate better prices for their hard work. This could potentially reduce postharvest losses and prove to be functional for commercial tomato farmers, retailers/wholesalers with improved marketability, and ultimately consumers. Future studies should investigate the efficacy of these treatments on the same variety as well as different varieties under varied environmental conditions to ensure broader applicability.
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