4 Papaya
papaya growing states of India are Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Karnataka, Maharashtra,
Uttarakhand, Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal and Andhra Pradesh (Figure 1.4).
Papaya has gained more importance owing to its high palatability, fruitability
throughout the year, early fruiting, highest productivity per unit area and multifari-
ous uses like food, medicine and industrial input. Being highly remunerative and
short duration fruit crop, it has a tremendous impact on economic and nutritional
propitiations (Saran and Choudhary 2013). It needs plentiful rainfall or irrigation but
must have good drainage. Papayas grow and produce well in a wide variety of soils.
The tree often develops a strong taproot shortly after planting (Figure 1.5). The well-
drained sandy loam soil with adequate organic matter is most important for papaya
cultivation. Papaya fruit is consumed at both unripe and ripe stages. Unripe fruits
are cooked and utilised as vegetables, processed products and as a source of papain
(Mendoza 2007). Unripe papaya fruits are consumed both as a cooked vegetable and
processed products (Morton 1987). Ripe papaya is consumed as a fresh fruit and
also used for processing. At the unripe stage, the fruit is consumed as a cooked veg-
etable where papaya is widely grown (Mano et al. 2009), for example, in Thailand,
unripe fruits are used as ingredients in papaya salad and cooked dishes (Sone et al.
1998) and in Puerto Rico, unripe fruits are canned in sugar syrup and sold either in
local markets or exported (Morton 1987). The preserved unripe papaya fruit, which
contains high sugar content, is used as an additive in ice cream. Green papaya fruit
must be cooked (often boiled) prior to consumption to denature the papain in the
latex (Odu et al. 2006). Ripe papaya fruits and papaya products, for their flavour and
nutritional value, are consumed by humans (Saran 2010).
1.2 Nutritive Value
The main constituent of Carica papaya fruit is water, like other fruits. The dry mat-
ter content increases during fruit development from unripe to ripe stages (Chavasit
Oceania
0.13%
Africa
13.16%
Central
America
9.56%North America
0.14%e
Caribbean
South America 1.38%
23.09%Asia
52.55%FIGURE 1.3 Papaya production by geographic area, 2008–2010. (Adapted from FAOSTAT,
2012b, Crop Production, http://faostat.fao.org/site/567/default.aspx#ancor; Fernando, J. A., M.
Melo, and M. K. M. Soares, 2001, Brazilian Archives of Biology and Technology, 4 4:2 47–55.)