ABSTRACT
Papaya (Carica papaya L.) is an important fruit crop in the tropics and subtropics because of its pleasant flavor, year-round bearing habit, and short growth cycle of 10-12 months from seed to ripe fruit. Ripe papayas are consumed at breakfast or as dessert, or the immature fruit is cooked with meat as squash is. Green fruit serve as a daily staple in papaya salad in Southeast Asia and in Africa are tapped for the latex, which contains papain, the main ingredient in meat tenderizer. Ripe fruit are a rich source of vitamins A and C (Arriola et al., 1980) and provide enzymes that assist in healthy digestion. The crop is grown in a wide range of cropping systems from small home gardens to large-scale plantation agriculture in the Americas, Asia, Australia, and Africa. In Hawaii, papayas constitute the sixth most important agricultural crop after pineapples, sugarcane, macadamia nuts, coffee, and foliage crops. The farm-gate value is about $18 million annually. It is raised on about 500 small farms for a total of about 3000 acres, on the islands of Hawaii (Big Island), Oahu, Kauai, Molokai, and Maui. Prior to near destruction of the industry by an epidemic of papaya ringspot virus (PRSV) in 1992, 95% of the industry was located in Puna on the Big Island.
