Euro-mediterranean symposium on fruit and vegetable processing 2016

Fruit and Vegetable play an important part in Human nutrition, and in particular important components of the so-called ‘Mediterrenean diet’. They are for the most part consumed after processing, be it industrial or domestic (cooking). This processing, like for all foods, must conciliate palatability and adapted sensory characteristics, preservation of nutritional qualities and consumer safety. Fruit and Vegetable present specific challenges in their processing, notably because of their variability (including their evolution after harvest) and their inherent structure. Two main topics are now emerging:
 How can fruit and vegetable processing contribute to enhance environmental sustainability, in particular through reduction of losses and waste, through safe and sober processes…
 How to increase attractivity of fruit and vegetable-based foods, when, in spite of 5-a-day campaigns, their use decreases in the younger generations in Europe, while in the South disaffection for traditional foods also leads to decreased fruit and vegetable consumption, particularly in poor or urban populations?

There are many research groups currently working on fruit and vegetable processing, but it is a very dispersed community, with interests that may be primarily focused on a given process, on a given fruit species, on a given nutritional target… There is currently no common forum to meet and discuss the issues that are both specific to fruit and vegetables processing and generic to many fruit and vegetable species, and this is what the present Symposium aims to provide.

Within Agrolopis Fondation network, a substantial number of researchers are concerned by fruit and vegetables, with genetics (GAFL, AGAP), eco-physiology (PSH, AMAP, DIADE), postharvest and processing (UMR Qualisud, UMR SPO, UMR SQPOV), socio-economics (UMR MOISA). Nutrition questions are also studied by related groups such as UMR NORT and NUTRIPASS. Their activity and excellence is concretised in an number of national and European projects, such as ILLIAD, RIBENUT, OPTICOLD, Sustain’Apple (ANR), OPTIFEL, AFTER (FP7), etc. This community has the potential to be a central point for research on fruit and vegetable processing.