LAUSR

ABSTRACT Banana is the most important cash and food security crop in Ethiopia. However, the ripening quality and postharvest life of the fruits are not well studied to meet the domestic and international market standards. An experiment was therefore conducted with objectives of describing the ripening behaviors and postharvest qualities of banana varieties and identifying appropriate postharvest technologies for improved ripening and long postharvest life of fruits. The results of the experiment revealed the existence of highly significant variation between banana varieties, ripening temperatures, packaging, and their second- and third-order interactions for length, weight, volume, pulp-to-peel ratio, and pulp diameter. All fruits of the varieties except the local could not ripe well without ripening treatments. Temperatures at 15°C and 20°C were optimum for yellow peel color development. Better eating fruit quality and peel color development were achieved by ripening of fruits at 20°C and 25°C with perforated plastic packaging. Further research on treatments and technologies that can improve the ripening quality and postharvest life of Ethiopian banana like the use of ethylene should be done, and studies on physicochemical changes occurred during fruit maturation and ripening of Ethiopian grown banana varieties in different seasons and agroecologies should also be conducted to reduce the post harvest loss caused by fruit ripening problem.