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This flagship project, supported by Agropolis Fondation (900 K€), brings together 6 units of Agropolis network around the issues of managing the interfaces between fruit production and processing.

How to cope with the increasing diversity and heterogeneity of agricultural raw materials to optimize their transformation into food products that are consistent with consumer expectations and constant? This is an issue for all processors, while producers have to orient their production to market opportunities. Expected developments in agronomic systems to meet sustainibility requirement while adapting to climate change lead to an increase in uncertainties about product characteristics and availability.

The interfaces between production and processing are thus key points for food chain sustainability as a whole. It is necessary to set up tools for facilitating and choosing raw materials best suited to consumer requirements. These tools will also help to limit the losses and wastage by limiting the rejections of non-compliant products (before or after processing).

This problem is particularly crucial for fruit and vegetables: heterogeneity is further increased by individual fruit differences, related to fruit supply and sunshine exposition, as well as their rapid evolution during ripening and storage. In addition, there is little knowledge of the factors that affect F&V processability, and the potential of processes to limit or otherwise valorize this heterogeneity.

  This project is organized in 5 tasks, transversal to three fruit species (apple, mango, grapes) :

• Task 1 consists  in setting up indicators and tools to better characterize fruit heterogeneity and processability;
• Task 2 consists to study the interaction between fruits and processes;
• Task 3 consists to characterize microbiota of the fruit surface;
• Task 4 aims to link the eco-physiological and process models;
• Task 5 aims to better understand how the knowledge of processability can impact relationships between actors in the food chain.

The combinations of fruits and processed products were chosen as examples of typical behavior, related to eco-physiological conditions: apple into applesauce, with the problem of the structural dry matter content and cells size as determinants of the texture, mango into dried mango with the problematic of the sugar types and concentrations, and the grape into wine with the question of the ripening impact on polyphenols extraction.