Uma abordagem exploratória para identificação das condições relacionadas às perdas de frutos de tomate no município de Carmópolis de Minas - MG

Abstract

Tomato is the second most consumed vegetable in the world, but in some producing regions of the country it still has a nomadic nature. One of the reasons for crop migration is the importance of diseases caused by soil borne pathogens. In order to determine the factors that govern the importance of these diseases, we determined the loss pattern and cost of tomato production in the county of Carmópolis de Minas-MG. In all tomato production areas, plant wilt was identified for the presence of pectnolytic bacteria. The cost of tomato production was higher than that reported in other regions and although the products adopted were aimed at plant nutrition and pest and disease control, they did not guarantee a reduction in tomato fruit losses of up to 30% throughout the production chain and marketing of tomatoes. Fruit loss was mainly associated with boron and calcium deficiency. Although smaller in the field, the occurrence of pectinolytic bacteria became the most important loss along the tomato marketing chain, reaching its maximum on the supermarket shelf. Furthermore, a significant association was found between calcium deficiency and an increase in pectinolytic bacterial symptoms. Furthermore, of all losses as qualitative, calcium deficiency and occurrence of pectinolytic bacteria were the only ones with brix above 4.5. Therefore, in order to reduce the cost of tomato production and make the production of table tomatoes sustainable, we propose a critical review on the use of phytosanitary products and fertilizers to reduce losses, which in turn will contribute to reduce losses by diseases caused by necrotrophic pathogens such as pectinolytic bacteria.