Packhouse
Between harvest and pack
The point after picking where handling creates new opportunities for infection, and where condition at grading is decided.
The problem
Where does the loss actually happen?
Most of it is gone before anything reaches a shelf, and the biggest single line is not decay at the end of life. It is condition at grading.
A head of produce rejected at grading has absorbed every cost you will ever put into it and returns nothing. It is a more familiar loss to most packhouses than end-of-life spoilage, it is measured every day, and it is argued about with the customer every week. Yet almost every intervention sold into this market is priced and pitched against the shelf, not against the grade-out.
The scale is not marginal. WRAP's study of UK primary production found 3.6 million tonnes of food surplus and waste a year, 7.2 per cent of production, worth around 1.2 billion pounds. Horticultural crops account for 54 per cent of that by product type. At crop level the rates are the ones growers recognise: 17.3 per cent of onion production, 15.7 per cent of carrots, 13 per cent of cabbage.
Sitting behind the commercial loss is a duty that has changed the conversation. Chlorate carries enforced maximum residue levels under Commission Regulation (EU) 2020/749, with a default of 0.01 mg per kg, and Food Standards Scotland is explicit that the responsibility for demonstrating residues are legally sourced rests entirely with the food business operator. Not the supplier of the treatment. You.
The awkward part is that the hygiene step most sites rely on is itself a route by which those residues arrive. So the honest question is not whether to keep produce clean. It is what you are prepared to leave behind on it.
How it works
What are we actually doing to the crop?
We reduce the load of spoilage organisms on the surface and the cut surface, at the moment after harvest when new infection takes hold, so that decay starts later than it otherwise would.
This is prevention, not rescue. It slows the onset of new infection on sound product. It does not recover produce that is already infected, and nothing here reverses damage that has happened. A site expecting a cure will be disappointed, and we would rather say so before a trial than after one.
It is also additive to your cold chain, never a substitute for it. Temperature remains the primary variable in how long anything lasts, and any site being told otherwise is being told something untrue. What we are adding sits alongside refrigeration and handling discipline, and it works hardest where those are already being done properly.
The point of application matters more than the product does. Decay usually begins at the cut surface, which is exactly where handling, grading and packing create the opportunity, and exactly where an intervention has the most to work with.
Around that, the same programme can address the water produce is handled in, the surfaces and crates it touches, the air in the store and the growing media it came from. Most suppliers to this market sell one of those. Being able to put all of them under a single accountable programme is the practical difference, because a decay problem rarely has a single cause.
What you get
The outcomes we work towards
Obligation
A defensible answer on residues
The duty to demonstrate that residues on your crop are legally sourced sits with you. We work on the hygiene step that creates the exposure, and we measure what is left behind rather than asserting it, so that what you tell an auditor is something you can show.
Cost
Condition held to the point of grading
The loss line most sites can already quantify is product downgraded or rejected at grading. Holding condition through handling and packing is where the money is, and it is where our own evidence speaks most directly.
Cost
One programme across the site
The water, the surfaces, the crates, the store air and the produce itself, addressed together and owned by one accountable party. Fewer suppliers pointing at each other when a decay problem appears in the middle of a season.
Risk
Evidence you can put in front of a technologist
Retailer technical teams read the method before the conclusion. We give you the method, the conditions and the limits, not a headline figure that falls over on the second question.
Obligation
Progress against a public commitment
Nearly 200 organisations have signed the UK Food and Drink Pact, targeting a 50 per cent cut in per capita food waste by 2030 against a 2007 baseline, and progress across the industry is off track. Post-harvest loss is one of the few levers left once the cold chain and forecasting are already optimised.
Risk
A trial designed to be believed
Replication, a comparator that reflects what you already run, blind scoring and a declared endpoint. Designed so that a result, either way, is one your customer would accept.
Evidence
What the evidence shows, and what it does not
In an independent laboratory evaluation, a single low-dose post-harvest treatment left produce in visibly better condition than untreated controls at both ambient and refrigerated storage, with the difference clearest by day 20. That work was on broccoli, it was a visual assessment, and it produced no shelf-life figure of any kind, because neither refrigerated arm was run to the point of failure. We are not going to tell you it did. The figures below are the size of the problem in UK primary production, from WRAP's study published in 2019 on 2017 data. They are not our results.
3.6m tonnesUK food surplus and waste in primary production each year, 7.2 per cent of production (WRAP, 2019 study on 2017 data)
54%of that primary production waste is horticultural crops, by product type (WRAP, same study)
17.3%of UK onion production wasted after harvest. Carrots 15.7 per cent, cabbage 13 per cent (WRAP, same study)
0.01 mg/kgdefault maximum residue level for chlorate under Commission Regulation (EU) 2020/749, enforced
Where it applies
Where this fits in an operation
The honest part
What we are not claiming
This category has overclaimed for twenty years, and technologists in it have learned to discount whatever they are told. So here is the position stated plainly.
We do not have a shelf-life figure, in days or in percentages, for any crop. Our independent evaluation was a visual assessment on broccoli with three samples per arm, no blinding, no microbiological counts and no comparator against the wash a packhouse already runs, and it stopped while both refrigerated arms were still viable. That means it establishes a direction and nothing more, and we will not stretch it into a number. We also will not claim a residue advantage until we have measured one against a like-for-like comparator, even though that is the claim we most want to make. Anyone offering you a multiple of shelf life for a crop like yours should be asked for the method, the replication and the endpoint before the number.
What we propose instead is a trial on your crop, on your site, designed so that the result is one your customer would accept: replicated, blind scored against a declared endpoint, with a comparator that reflects what you already do, and with residues measured. If it does not work on your product, you will know that quickly and cheaply.
Questions answered
How many extra days of shelf life will this give me?
We do not know, and we will not guess. Our independent evaluation produced no day-count because it stopped while both refrigerated arms were still in usable condition, so no maximum was ever reached. Anyone quoting you a day-count for your crop should be asked which study produced it, how many replicates it used and where the endpoint was set.
Does this replace refrigeration or cold chain discipline?
No, and it should never be sold as though it does. Temperature is the primary variable in how long perishable product lasts. This is additive to a properly run cold chain and works hardest where handling and temperature are already under control.
Will it recover product that has already started to deteriorate?
No. It is preventative, not curative. It reduces the load of spoilage organisms on sound product so that new infection starts later. Produce that is already infected will continue to deteriorate.
What about residues on the crop?
Chlorate carries enforced maximum residue levels under Commission Regulation (EU) 2020/749, with a default of 0.01 mg per kg, and Food Standards Scotland is clear that the duty to demonstrate residues are legally sourced rests with the food business operator. We treat that as a measurement question rather than a marketing one, and residue analysis against a like-for-like comparator is part of how we would run a trial with you.
We are an organic grower. Does that change anything?
Yes, materially, and it needs answering before anything is applied to a crop destined for a commercial channel. Organic certification rules on what may be applied directly to produce are stricter than the rules covering buildings and equipment, and the position must be confirmed with your certifier first. We will raise it with you rather than wait for you to raise it with us.
What would a first trial actually involve?
A defined crop, a defined stage in your process, and a design your customer would accept: replication rather than a handful of samples, blind scoring against a declared endpoint, a comparator reflecting your current practice, and residue analysis. We would rather run one properly designed trial than three quick ones that prove nothing.
Do you work outside fresh produce?
The same approach applies to prepared produce, fish and protein handling, cut flowers and ornamentals, and to the stores, crates and equipment product passes through. The commercial problem is the same wherever perishability decides margin.
Start with your grade-out, not with our claims
Tell us what your rejections at grading actually cost you and where your residue exposure sits today. If there is nothing here worth trialling on your crop, we will tell you.
Speak to the Team
Tell us your challenge
Tell us the cost, the risk or the obligation you are facing. A senior member of our team will respond, in confidence, with how we would help.
Every enquiry is handled in strict confidence.