Trends and COVID-19 Disruptions on Innovation Management Aspects in Fruits and Vegetables Preservation

Abstract

The research aimed at analyzing several facets of innovation management in the field of fruit and vegetable preservation. The analysis was based on a review of the trends using the Web of Science database and a questionnaire survey to assess the potential influence of the COVID-19 pandemic on the condition of innovation management in the field of fruits and vegetables preservation. A thorough analysis and evaluation of 256 journal articles retrieved from the Web of Science database were done. The results show that there has been an imbalance in the distribution of researchers by region and that research on fruit and vegetable preservation innovations did not increase until recent years. A total of 18.04% of the papers on the subject that the investigation could locate were generated by Italy and the USA, accounting for around 9.02% of them each. Furthermore, the results showed that, in terms of the demand for innovations and investment level in fruit and vegetable preservation, the COVID-19 innovation disruption had a bigger influence on large-scale firms than on small businesses. It is also worth pointing out that the research findings to now, which have primarily been based on laboratory-scale studies, have not fully taken into account the cost-effectiveness of the suggested preservation technologies. The goal of a cost-effective therapy can only be partially met by the different approaches that have been proposed. If sustainable innovation management in the field of fruits and vegetables preservation is to be achievable on a global scale, an effort must be made to fund more research activities, particularly in the cold and arid and semi-arid regions. Practical considerations dictate that small-scale research that uses readily available and affordable materials be encouraged. This will make it possible to do a logical cost-benefit analysis of a particular technique or strategy for addressing fruit and vegetable preservation.