Rumiko Nakashita

Chapter 18 - Authentication and Traceability of Fruits and Vegetables

Abstract The food industry has been expanding globally, and consumers can obtain various fruits and vegetables from all over the world. The organic agriculture, cultivation area, and cultivar are the important factors in determining the market value of fruits and vegetables. The characteristics of vegetables and fruits from conventional and organic farming have been reported by using stable nitrogen isotope analysis. The cultivars have been identified powerfully by gene analysis using polymerase chain reaction. The relationship between chemical compositions and cultivation areas has been evaluated using trace element compositions, stable isotope ratios, and metabolomics. In this chapter, we review the applications to the discrimination of agriculture practice and geographical origin of fruits and vegetables by analytical method focusing on mass spectrometry, such as inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry and isotope ratio mass spectrometry.