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Evaluation of AVRDC Advanced Lines of Long Shelf life Tomato in the Terai
Region of Nepal

Article  in  Acta Horticulturae · November 2016

DOI: 10.17660/ActaHortic.2017.1179.49

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Evaluation of AVRDC advanced lines of long-shelf-life
tomato in the Terai region of Nepal
R. Rawal1, D.M. Gautam2, I.P. Gautam1, R.B. Khadka1, K.M. Tripathi2, P. Hanson3, A.L. Acedo Jr.4,
W. Easdown4, J.A. Hughes3 and J.D.H. Keatinge3
1RegionalAgricultural Research Station, NARC, Nepalgunj, Banke, Nepal; 2Agriculture and Forestry University,
Rampur, Chitwan, Nepal; 3AVRDC – The World Vegetable Center Headquarters, Shanhua, Tainan, Taiwan; 4AVRDC
– The World Vegetable Center South Asia, Hyderabad, India.

Abstract
Tomato is one of the leading commercial vegetables grown widely in the plains
and hills of Nepal. In the Terai (plains) region, tomato is cultivated in the rainy and
winter seasons. Productivity is very low, averaging at 13.5 t ha-1. A primary reason is
the lack of appropriate, high-yielding varieties with multiple traits including good
shelf life. This study evaluated nine advanced lines of tomato with long shelf life from
the AVRDC – The World Vegetable Center (CLN3940, CLN3948, CLN3946, CLN3953,
CLN3961, CLN3947, CLN3949, CLN3954 and ‘Tanya’) and a local cultivar (‘Pusa Ruby’)
as control under field conditions in Nepalgunj, Banke, Nepal, during the 2014-2015
winter seasons. AVRDC’s recommendations for field trials and cultural management
were followed. Disease resistance and fruit yield, quality and shelf life differed widely
with tomato line. CLN3940 was resistant to late blight, was least affected by virus
diseases, and produced the biggest fruit (124.3 g fruit-1) and highest yield (113.3 t
ha-1). The local control had the highest vitamin C content, titratable acidity and pH
both at harvest and at the end of shelf life at ambient conditions but had the highest
weight loss during storage. CLN3940, CLN3947, CLN3948 and CLN3953 had a shelf life
of 8-10 days longer than that of the control. Similarly, their yields were 22-80 t ha-1
higher than that of the control, in addition to their multiple disease (late blight,
septorial blight and viral diseases) resistance trait. These four promising lines could
be further tested in advanced field trials.

Keywords: Solanum lycopersicum, postharvest life, multiple traits, yield, quality

INTRODUCTION
Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) is one of the most important commercial vegetable
crops, widely grown both in the plains and in the hills of Nepal. It is consumed fresh as salad,
cooked with other vegetables or used as chutney for fresh consumption. It can also be
processed in various products such as juice, sauce, ketchup, canned fruits, puree, paste, etc.
Nutritionally, tomato is one of the important sources of vitamin C, carotenoids and other
minerals such as iron and phosphorus, which are necessary for healthy growth (Babalola et
al., 2010). The antioxidants may be considered a valuable quality attribute of tomatoes, and
it is important to minimize loss of these compounds after harvest.
In Nepal, tomato is cultivated during the summer and rainy seasons in the hills and
during the rainy and winter seasons in the Terai (plains). The cultivation of tomato is
expanding rapidly in Nepal due to high market demand and high income from its cultivation.
The annual production of tomato is 232,897 t from 17,273 ha, with average yield of 13.5 t
ha-1, which is far below the world average of 23.98 t ha-1 (ABPSD, 2014). Commonly grown
cultivars are indigenous types with low productivity, inferior fruit quality and short shelf life.
The postharvest loss of tomato in Nepal is about 50% of total production (Bistha, 2002).
Unavailability of suitable high-yielding cultivars with disease resistance and long shelf life is
a major bottleneck. Furthermore, the tomato value chain is highly linked with the ability of
cultivars to maintain certain postharvest qualities such as low weight loss, few fruit cracks,
low decay incidence and long shelf life. High-quality tomato has firm appearance, uniform
and shiny color, and no signs of injury, shriveling or decay (Sargent and Moretti, 2002). The

Acta Hortic. 1179. ISHS 2017. DOI 10.17660/ActaHortic.2017.1179.49 317

Proc. III Southeast Asia Symp. on Quality Management in Postharvest Systems
Eds.: A.L. Acedo Jr. et al.
cultivation of long shelf life tomato may help farmers, wholesalers and retailers to have a
longer period of time to transport and market their produce. It can help to reduce
postharvest losses, which is equally as crucial as increasing production in order to meet the
demand of an increasing population. This study was conducted to identify potential high-
yielding and long shelf life tomato cultivars using advanced lines from AVRDC.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

The study was conducted during the winter season from September 2014 to March
2015 at the Nepal Agricultural Research Council Regional Agricultural Research Station,
Khajura, Nepalgunj, Banke District, which is located at 28°06’N and 81°37’E, 181 m above
sea-level. The total fortnightly rainfall of the experimental site was 0-197 mm, while the
temperature ranged from 7 to 29°C and the relative humidity from 91 to 96%. The soil
characteristics of the experimental area were silty loam, poor in organic carbon and
available nitrogen, medium in available phosphorus and potassium, and with a pH of 7.2.
AVRDC’s procedures for tomato variety field trials were followed (Hanson et al., 2011).
The experimental area was laid out in a randomized complete block design with three
replications; each replicate plot size was 4.8 m2. The treatments included nine AVRDC
advanced lines of long shelf life tomato (CLN3940, CLN3948, CLN3946, CLN3953, CLN3961,
CLN3947, CLN3949, CLN3954 and ‘Tanya’) and a commercial cultivar, ‘Pusa Ruby’, as a local
control. AVRDC’s recommended cultural management practices from seedling production to
harvesting were followed (Hanson et al., 2000; Srinivasan, 2010). The important diseases
late blight, Septoria leaf spot and tomato yellow leaf curl virus (TYLCV) were evaluated at
the time when disease was found to be most severe following AVRDC’s descriptors (Hanson
et al., 2011). AVRDC line ‘Tanya’ was totally destroyed by late blight; hence, it has no data
here.
Fruit were harvested at the breaker stage from inner-row plants in each plot. Fruit
with defects were discarded, and the marketable fruit yield was taken from four harvests.
Fruit quality attributes measured from 10 representative samples per replicate included
average fruit weight, polar and equatorial diameter using a Vernier caliper, and blossom-end
and stem-end scar using a metric ruler. Total soluble solids (TSS) was measured using a
refractometer (Atago RX-1000, Japan), titratable acidity (TA) by the titrimetric method with
standardized NaOH and phenolphthalein as indicator, pH using a pH meter (Crison
Instruments SA, Spain), vitamin C content by the 2,6-dichloroindophenol titrimetric method
(AOAC, 2006), and color L* and a* values using a Minolta CR-400 colorimeter (Minolta
Camera Co., Ltd., Ramsey, NJ, USA). The L* coordinate indicates darkness or lightness of color
while coordinate a* indicates color direction: positive values – red direction; negative values
– green direction.
For determination of shelf life attributes, 20 defect-free fruit of uniform size from each
replicate treatment-1 were stored under ambient conditions (24±2°C, 74±4% RH) and
monitored for changes in color (i.e. L* and a* values) and weight loss. At the end of shelf life,
the chemical attributes (TSS, TA, pH and vitamin C content) were measured.
The results were analyzed using the Microsoft Excel 2007 and MSTAT-C 1986
programs. Treatment means were compared by least significant difference (LSD) test.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Disease resistance
CLN3940 was highly resistant to late blight with no plant affected, as well as to TYLCV
with very minimal infection (Figure 1). CLN3948 was also highly resistant to late blight but
not to TYLCV. Other lines and the control showed moderate to high susceptibility to late
blight and TYLCV. Septoria leaf spot incidence varied and was lowest in CLN3949 and
highest in CLN3948. Of these three diseases, late blight and TYLCV are the most serious
problems for tomato cultivation in Nepal. Late blight is a major threat during the winter
season while TYLCV occurs during the rainy season. Sometimes late blight causes complete
failure of crops in the winter season, as seen in the present study in the case of ‘Tanya’.

318
Resistance to these two diseases is a major criterion for selection of cultivars in Nepal.

Figure 1. Disease tolerance (mean+SE) of different tomato lines. Late blight scoring: 0 to 9,
with 0 as no damage, highly resistant, and 9 as very severe damage, highly
susceptible; Septoria leaf spot scoring: 0 to 5, with 0 as no damage, highly
resistant, and 5 as very severe damage, highly susceptible; TYLCV scoring: 0 to 6,
with 0 as no damage, highly resistant, and 6 as very severe damage, highly
susceptible.

Fruit yield
Fruit yield was highest in CLN3940 (113 t ha-1) followed by CLN3948, CLN3953 and
CLN3947 (55-87 t ha-1), which was much higher than that of the control (33 t ha-1) (Table 1).
All AVRDC lines were big-fruited, with average weight per fruit ranging from 81 to 125 g, or
more than two times that of the control (33 g), and with significantly greater polar and
equatorial diameters than the control. Most lines and the control had greater equatorial
diameter than polar diameter indicating they were a flattened, spherical shape, which is
desirable in postharvest handling as these fruit are more resistant to physical damage than
the oblong or egg-shaped fruit. Smooth and small blossom-end scar (BES) and stem-end scar
(SES) are criteria for selection for good postharvest quality (Suslow and Cantwell, 2013).
Larger BES and SES can increase fruit bruising during packaging and transporting, and
provide more entry for microbial infection. Results showed that all AVRDC lines had larger
BES and SES than the control. This was expected as these lines have large-sized fruit. In any
crop breeding program, yield is the most important factor. Unless a new cultivar has a yield
potential equal to or exceeding that of current cultivars, it generally cannot be successful
even if it may contain other improved characteristics (Foolad, 2007). The results of the
present study demonstrate the great potential of some AVRDC lines as super high-yielders
for use in future cultivar development.

Fruit quality and shelf life

TSS of breaker fruit of the different entries varied from 3.4 to 4.2 °Brix (Table 2).
Among the four promising high-yielders, only CLN3947 had significantly lower TSS than the
control. TA and pH were significantly lower in all AVRDC lines than in the control. TA and pH
are usually negatively correlated, i.e. low TA is associated with high pH (Anthon et al., 2011).
However, TA is reportedly not a good predictor of pH since pH is a combined function of
titratable acid and conjugate base (Sadler and Murphy, 2003). TA is only a simple estimate of
total acid as there are many acids that cannot be differentiated through titration.
Furthermore, vitamin C content was lower in all AVRDC lines (11-14 mg 100 g-1) than in the
control (31 mg 100 g-1). At the end of shelf life under ambient conditions when the fruit
turned red-ripe, vitamin C content decreased in all entries (Table 2). However, the high-

319
yielding lines CLN3940 and CLN3948 had only a slight reduction in vitamin C content in
contrast to the two other high-yielding lines CLN3953 and CLN3947 and the control.
Similarly, TSS and TA decreased at the end of shelf life while pH increased. No significant
treatment differences in TSS were noted while TA in all AVRDC lines was statistically
comparable with that of the control. The pH of the control remained much higher than that
of all AVRDC lines.

Table 1. Fruit yield and yield components of different tomato lines.

Fruit yield Fruit weight Polar Equatorial Blossom-end Stem-end
Line
(t ha )
-1 (g) diameter (cm) diameter (cm) scar (cm) scar (cm)
CLN 3940 113.3a 124.3a 6.06a 6.67a 2.11bcd 14.00a
CLN 3948 86.7b 81.2d 4.86b 5.05d 1.50cd 12.00ab
CLN 3946 42.8d 86.3cd 5.39ab 5.58bcd 1.44cd 9.22bc
CLN 3953 63.1c 94.2bcd 5.54ab 5.42cd 1.61cd 10.11bc
CLN 3961 25.9e 124.9a 5.88a 5.41cd 2.33bcd 12.06ab
CLN 3947 54.8c 115.3ab 5.87a 6.11abc 2.56abc 12.11ab
CLN 3949 39.8d 95.9bcd 6.06a 6.24ab 3.11ab 11.89ab
CLN 3954 32.6de 109.9abc 6.13a 6.27ab 3.67a 14.44a
Pusa Ruby 33.3de 32.9e 3.18c 4.11e 1.10d 7.14c
CV (%) 11.5 15.0 7.3 7.5 30.4 12.0
Mean separation within columns by LSD, 5%.

Table 2. TSS, TA, pH and vitamin C contents of different tomato lines before storage (BS)
(breaker fruit) and at the end of shelf life (ESL) (red-ripe fruit) under ambient
conditions.
TSS (°Brix) TA (% citrate) pH Vitamin C (mg 100 g-1)
Line
BS ESL BS ESL BS ESL BS ESL
CLN 3940 4.17a 2.73 1.57b 1.03abc 4.32c 4.75b 12.22b 11.56b
CLN 3948 4.00a 3.33 1.70b 1.33abc 4.49bc 4.79b 10.67b 9.11bc
CLN 3946 3.83ab 3.13 1.33b 0.90bc 4.51bc 4.96b 12.44b 6.00c
CLN 3953 3.83ab 3.20 1.50b 1.57ab 4.76b 4.87b 13.78b 6.22c
CLN 3961 4.17a 3.43 1.73b 1.60a 4.41bc 4.90b 14.00b 10.67b
CLN 3947 3.43b 2.77 1.23b 1.03abc 4.49bc 4.84b 13.33b 5.56c
CLN 3949 3.40b 3.67 1.73b 0.83c 4.28c 4.84b 11.33b 7.56bc
CLN 3954 3.83ab 3.57 1.47b 0.97abc 4.67bc 4.96b 12.89b 8.22bc
Pusa Ruby 4.13a 3.03 2.50a 1.17abc 5.61a 5.99a 31.11a 17.78a
CV (%) 6.6 15.3 25.2 29.9 4.6 2.2 20.3 23.9
Mean separation within columns by LSD, 5%.

During ambient storage, fruit from all entries changed color from breaker (negative a*
values) to red (positive a* values), which was associated with ripening (Figure 2). No
pronounced treatment differences were noted. Complete reddening (a* of more than 20)
occurred after 12-14 days of storage. The increase in a* was accompanied by a decrease in L*
values (Figure 2). There was no distinct relationship between L* and a* values except in the
control, in which after 14 days of storage and thereafter when the fruit further turned deep
red, a* values were highest and L* values were lowest among entries.
Weight loss increased with storage, which was more rapid in the control than in all
AVRDC lines (Figure 3). The control had a weight loss of more than 20%, which rendered the
fruit unmarketable after 8-10 days. This happened much later in all AVRDC lines. Of
particular note was the highest yielder, CLN3940, which had the lowest rate of weight loss
among all entries. It had a weight loss of more than 20% after 22 days of storage or about 4-

320
8 days later than the other high-yielding lines. Considering rates of both ripening and weight
loss, the results suggest that the ripe life of the high-yielding AVRDC lines was much longer
than that of the control.

Figure 2. Fruit color changes as a* (red) and lightness (L*) values of different tomato lines
during ambient storage.

Figure 3. Fruit weight loss of different tomato lines during ambient storage.

CONCLUSIONS
The marked variations in disease resistance and fruit yield, quality and shelf life
among the different entries seemed to be inherited traits. CLN3940 was the best performing
among the AVRDC lines as its yield and shelf life were much greater than that of the control.
The three other promising lines, CLN3948, CLN3953 and CLN3947, also greatly surpassed
the yield and shelf life of the control. These four advanced lines can therefore be evaluated
further in advanced yield trials.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This research was made possible through the support provided by the Bureau for Food
Security, U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), under the terms of award no.
AID-BFS-IO-12-00004. All opinions expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do
not necessarily reflect the views of the USAID.

321
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