School of Agricultural and Wine Sciences

Purpose of review: This study highlights the status of postharvest disease management of horticultural products in the Pacific Island Countries (PICs), and makes assessments of its importance. Further, it identifies opportunities and constraints, and possible ways of addressing them. Findings: Postharvest management of agricultural produce has been identified as a priority research area for the South Pacific region. Farmers, technical and extension personnel, transporters and retailers in the local markets are in most cases poorly trained in posthar-vest management of the horticultural crop. It is essential to promote and develop skills among the merchants in postharvest management in order to reduce postharvest losses as well as improve the quality and safety of the marketable fresh products. Relatively little research has been conducted on the postharvest pathogens associated with horticultural crops in the Pacific Islands region, very limited information on the authenticated records of these pathogens is available, while our knowledge of their effects on the crops is yet to be completed. While PICs face many challenges in the effective management of postharvest diseases of horticultural products, there are also opportunities to successfully and effectively develop domestic and export supply chains for horticultural produce. Directions for future research: Postharvest management is an essential component of an effective marketing system of horticultural products within the PICs. Innovations in postharvest disease management are therefore necessary in order to derive maximum benefits from crop production outputs by reducing losses and maintaining quality and nutritional value of the fresh produce.

Metarhizium anisopliae is an important fungal biocontrol agent of insect pests of agricultural crops. Genomics can aid the successful commercialization of biopesticides by identification of key genes differentiating closely related species, selection of virulent microbial isolates which are amenable to industrial scale production and formulation and through the reduction of phenotypic variability. The genome of Metarhizium isolate ARSEF23 was recently published as a model for M. anisopliae, however phylogenetic analysis has since re-classified this isolate as M. robertsii. We present a new annotated genome sequence of M. anisopliae (isolate Ma69) and whole genome comparison to M. robertsii (ARSEF23) and M. acridum (CQMa 102). Whole genome analysis of M. anisopliae indicates significant macrosynteny with M. robertsii but with some large genomic inversions. In comparison to M. acridum, the genome of M. anisopliae shares lower sequence homology. While alignments overall are co-linear, ...