Mango Fruit Case Study

1.1 Background

Malaysia is a producer of a wide range of tropical fruits such as pineapple, banana, mango, rambutan, durian, mangosteen, jack fruit, and star fruit. However, the entire fruit industry in Malaysia is relatively small and unable to meet the demand. Therefore, government has to import fruit from neighbouring country such as Thailand, the Philippines, and India especially on mango fruit.

Mango (Mangifera indica L.) is considered as one of the most popular fruits among people in the tropical area and developed countries (Lucy, 2011). Due to its wide adaptability, high nutritional value, richness in variety, delicious taste, pleasant flavour, and attractive appearance, the demand on the mango fruit is still high until today (Anon, 1998).

Malaysia has many types of mangoes cultivar such as Maha

However, work on trees less than three-year-old has not been sufficiently documented (Husen et al., 2012).

Study on Harumanis in Malaysia is still lacking especially on flowering manipulation. Therefore, this study is carried out as an attempt to stimulate flowering of Harumanis outside Perlis. The growing environment that similar to Perlis wheather which has dry period was developed and the use of growth substances particularly PBZ and combine with drought stress were imposed to stimulate profuse flowering and fruiting of Harumanis.

Therefore, this study is very important to determine the effect of PBZ and water stress on vegetative growth and reproductive of Harumanis. In order to meet the above objective, two experiments were carried out in container under field condition as follows:

1. The effect of PBZ and water stress on vegetative growth (leaf sizes and shoot length), physiological responses and biochemical content of mango leaves cv. Harumanis plants.

2. The effect of PBZ on flowering of mango cv. Harumanis under water stress