CA&Palliflex: where is better to storage berries

Right way in storage berries is a guarantee of successful business

Information and news portal about fruit and vegetable markets East-Fruit.com published a new article-interview by Anatoliy Bogdan, Insolar-Kholod director, «CA&Palliflex: where is better to storage berries»

There are not so many up-to-date storages for berries in Ukraine – next to nothing. This wields major influence on right methods of crop storage, believes Anatoliy Bogdan, director of Insolar-Kholod – the company, which has been for years engaged in construction of cold storages for Ukrainian fruit and vegetable producers.

What is the right way of berry storage, what kind of berries should be stored and what kind of berries should be better shock frozen, Anatoliy Bogdan told in the interview for SEEDS.

– What is the best way how to storage picked-up berries?
– There are 2 ways of storage:
• In CA rooms – if sale of products is started from, for example, 10 tons;
• In cold rooms using the Palliflex storage system – if sales revenue is small. For example, several dozens or hundreds of kilos, in this way it is more profitable to use exactly the storage on pallets (Palliflex)

The case is that when opening a CA room it is better to sell berries as soon as possible. If we open such a room, berries “get up” and start “breathing” actively, loosing moisture actively, ripening actively. All this results in worthless of berries some time later.

Insolar-Kholod is experienced in design storages especially for sweet cherries with cold rooms with the capacity of exactly 20 tons – this is the capacity of the unloaded refrigerator truck. This way it is very simple: the room is opened, the truck is loaded, the goods left.

However, if discuss storage of red currants, whatever it could be kept long enough – up to 8 months, it is impossible to dispatch it by truck. All of us know what small packages it is sold in the shops. In this case it will be right to store using the Palliflex system, which makes possible to dispatch goods from the storage room by small batches (pallets).

– How should we store soft berries, as raspberries or strawberries?
– As for raspberries or strawberries, I would recommend to sell them fresh or frozen. But in this case frozen berries go not to the fresh market, but for smoothie, yoghurt and confectioneries.

Keeping cooled raspberries or strawberries during 2 weeks – this is not storage. Though appeared some new varieties, which can be stored up to a month.

But is there a sense to store it, if somebody grows a fresh one during the storage period, and you will be noncompetitive with the price anymore, because to the growing cost price adds the storage price – it is unprofitably. Also it is not advantageous to storage tomatoes, cucumbers for a long term. They are ripening in greenhouses all over the year.

– Are there any special demands for storage popular berries for now – blueberries?
– Blueberries to be put on storage are picked up slightly immature. And besides not all varieties of blueberries could be stored fresh – only late ones. Blueberries could be stored up to 2-2.5 months, it is cooling, CA.
Such a storage gives a possibility to sell products at the time when it will be in a popular demand, but not at the time when it is sold by everyone.

What these berries are good for – blueberries are dispatched by large batches. Storage rooms could be built per 15-20 tons. And it will be notably cheaper than using Palliflex storage, where each pallet is covered separately. Yes, not everybody will be able to build such storages. But those, who find funds, – they will be able to prolong a best before deadline and to sell blueberries at the more profitable price.

However, there are not so many advanced storages for berries in Ukraine – next to nothing. Most of the times Ukrainian berry growers build economy types of storages, but they won’t give the same storage effect as needed.

There are cold storages for cooling, for the sake of further sell. In other words, berries are picked up, cooled and sold during 2-3 days, but this is not storage. If we talk about storage, it is 2-2.5 months.

– Sea-buckthorn, forgotten industrial crop, is back to the fields of Ukraine. In order to store sea-buckthorn special cold storages are needed. Have you got an experience of design and construction of them?
– There is no such a bulk production of sea-buckthorn in Ukraine so that cold stores are needed, those who are engaged in sea-buckthorn in Ukraine – it is small volumes, which are processed at the same time.

But demand for it will be growing up. About 2-3 years ago we haven’t even heard about such a product as sea-buckthorn tea. Now it is available almost everywhere. Sea-buckthorn is product no. 1 in Germany.

Even we haven’t built cold storages for sea-buckthorn yet, but we are ready to construct cold storages for any kind of berries, vegetables and fruit. The newer product the more interesting it is for us. These are new technologies, new knowledge and new experience.

EastFruit