Processing of Horticultural Crops

Introduction

Introduction
For setting up fruit processing plant following cost and non cost factors affecting location of the plant are taken into consideration.

• Cost factors include raw material cost, transportations cost, cost of land, building and machinery, utilities cost, taxes and insurance costs.
• Non-cost factors consists of wages, salaries and incentives, market potential, community attitude, cost regulation, quality of life (school, living, recreation for workers etc) and environmental impact.

The main objective for selection of site for processing unit is to minimize the sum of all costs. To minimize the cost, one should think not only the today’s costs, but of long term costs as well.
Plant layout
The advantages of good plant layout are:-

1. Saving in floor space
2. Increased output
3. Fewer production delays
4. Reduced material handling
5. Greater utilization of machine and man power
6. Easier and better supervision
7. Less congestion and confusion
8. Better appearance and more sanitary condition of work areas
9. Reduced risk to health and safety of employees

1. Selection of Site for fruit processing unit
The location of unit is a dominant factor in viability (success or failure) of any processing industry. The following factors are considered in the selection of site for processing unit.

• Easy availability of raw material: Fruit and vegetables should be available in adequate quantity in the locality as they are highly perishable and deteriorate in long distance transportation. Other raw material like fuel, sugar, salt, chemicals etc and miscellaneous hand tools such as nuts, bolts, minor machinery parts etc should also be easily available in the locality.
• The site should be well connected with road.
• Proper transport facilities for movement of raw material and finished products.
• Area should have adequate supply of potable water and electricity (preferably three phase connection).
• Environment should be clean and free from debris, dirt, dust etc.
• The processing industry should preferably be well away from other industries to avoid soot, smoke and disagreeable odour.
• Provision for disposal of processing waste.
• Adequate availability of labour.
• The selected site should have scope for future expansion.

2. Building for processing plant: Following points should be kept in mind for establishment of building for the processing plant.

• It may be single storied or multi storied building. Single storeyed building is sufficient for small unit working for short periods during the year. However, for larger processing plants running throughout the year, multistoried construction is desired. It facilities the movement of raw material and finished products.
• Firm flooring to withstand constant use of water and movement of heavy machinery.
• Slope in flooring (2cm per meter) for proper drainage.
• All doors, windows and ventilators should be provided with fine wire gauge to prevent entry of flies, wasps and other insects.
• The roof of the building should be high and well ventilated to provide outlet for vapours and steam.
• The windows should have large glass panels for sky light and artificial lighting.
• Provision for dressing and toilet rooms separately for male and female workers.

3. Types of plant layout
The layout of a processing plant can be selected on the basis of either product layout or process layout (Fig 5.1). Product layout deals with either single fruit or single product such as apple processing in to juice or jam processing line in which only apple product can be handled.

• In product layout, all types of jam, pickle, juice or ketchup can be handled irrespective of fruit.
• In process layout, the machinery dealing with different unit operation is placed separately. For example for extraction of juice, the fruit is washed in washing line, grate in grating machine, pressed in hydraulic press and then juice is filled in filling line and processed in processing line.

Depending upon the size of the unit, the layout can be selected.

4. Water supply and drainage
Water of potable nature should be abundant in supply. If water is not of desired quality there is a need for installing water softening plant.

• A large quantity of water is needed for cleaning of fruits and vegetables, making syrup and brine, washing floors and machinery etc.
• Water system should work at sufficiently high pressure so that supplies can be made to different places without any break.
• The water should not be alkaline or very hard, should be free of organic matter.
• Presence of iron and sulphur make the water unsuitable for making syrups and brines.
• Saline water affects the taste of the products and should be avoided.

Fig 5.1: Layout of a processing plant.

5. Categories of fruit processing units
According to Fruit Products Order (1955) of the Govt. of India, the fruit processing units are categorized as under depending upon the installed capacity and requirement of minimum area for processing (Table 5.1).

Table 5.1: Categorization of fruit processing units and requirement of area.

Sr.No	Category	Annual Production, tonnes	Minimum manufacturing area required, m2
1.	Home scale(B)	25	25
2	Cottage scale	10-50	60
3.	Small Scale(A)	50-100	100
4.	Small Scale(B)	100-250	150
5.	Large Scale	>250	300
6.	Relabeller	-	-
7.

Source: www.mofpi.nic.in

The area shown is excluding store and office space. Besides the area occupied by the machinery should not be more than 50% of the total area. The minimum daily availability of water in different units should be 4.5 kilo litres (large scale), 1.13 kilo litres (small scale) and 0.45 kilo litres (cottage scale).