The Effect of Lemon Water on the Amounts of Brown Spots on Mangoes

The Philippines has always been proud of its national fruit – the mango, however, the fruit itself has not yet been able to conquer the world unlike its counterpart, the dried mango. We have recently seen the increase in the production of mangoes. The problem is, most of them are being sold at low prices and a lot have even been thrown away. The reason for the waste of mangoes is because there is an overproduction. The amount of supply exceeded the amount of demand. The overproduction of mangoes is further caused by the non-absorption of some countries that should have imported Filipino mangoes. The main reason behind this is because of the presence of brown spots. I want to find a way to make better quality of our mangoes. With this research, I hope that instead of wasting this potentially valuable product, we would be contributing to the economy.

According to the study done by Syed Nyamath and B Karthikeyan, Lemon Grass (Cymbopogon flexuosus) and (Cymbopogon citraus) have anti-fungal and anti-bacterial properties. The oils extracted from the Lemon Grass worked well against the bacteria Staphyloccocus aureus and the fungus called Aspergillus niger (Nyamath et al, 2018). I plan to use the oils extracted from the Lemon Grass to help reduce brown spots by regularly spraying our control group with a mixture of lemon grass oil and water, hereby to be called lemon water. I plan to buy 4 unripe mangoes, 2 of those mangoes will be our control group (no lemon water) and the other 2 will be our experimental group (with lemon water). The experiment will be observed and recorded diligently. This research can lead to helping our export industry and help reduce food waste in the country. This is very relevant today as we are a developing country and we need various initiatives in order to further our development. Furthermore, food wastage has been a global problem, and so we must do our share in lessening such occurrences. Thus, this research addresses the Sustainable Development Goal number 12 on Responsible Consumption and Production. The purpose of the study is to determine the effect of lemon water on the presence of brown spots on the mango. This study aims to

1. reduce the brown spots on mangoes.
2. make the mangoes healthier.
3. stop the overproduction and waste of mangoes.

If lemon grass extract has an effect on the presence of brown spots in mangoes, then the presence of lemon grass extract will reduce or possibly remove the presence of brown spots on the mango.