Indian Institute of Spices Research

Package of Practice - Pepper

Post Harvest Technology

In Kerala, black pepper flowers during May-June. The crop takes 6-8 months from flowering to harvest. The harvest season extends from November to January in the plains and January to March in the hills. During harvesting the whole spike is hand picked when one or two berries in the spike turn bright orange. The berries are separated from the spikes and dried in the sun for 7-10 days. The optimum moisture content in dried pepper to prevent mould attack is 8-10%.
The berries can be separated manually or mechanically using threshers. Threshers with capacities varying between 0.5 to 1.5 tonnes/hour are avilable. This enhances speedy and hygienic separation of black pepper berries. When dried, the berries retain the characteristic wrinkled appearance of black pepper of commerce. The fresh berries are dipped in hot water for a minute before drying in the sun which results in an attractive black colour and also reduces the drying time. Drying surfaces recommended are bamboo mat coated with fenugreek paste, cement floor, high density black polythene, etc, which gives better appearance and cleanliness to the dried product. Mechanical driers such as copra drier, convection drier and cascade type driers can also be employed for drying. The optimum temperature to be maintained in mechanical driers should be around 60ºC.
The white pepper of commerce is prepared either from freshly harvested berries or dried black pepper using special techniques such as retting, steaming and decortication. The recovery of white pepper from ripe pepper berries is about 25%. Water steeping is the most popular technique for preparing white pepper in which ripe pepper berries are soaked in water for 8-10 days and the outer skin is removed, washed and sun dried. The berries of Panniyur-1 are ideal to prepare white pepper.