Effects of Tomato Pomace Composts on Yield and Quality of Processing Tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum Mill.)

Organic farming encourages the use of organic waste materials as substitutes for chemical fertilizers. Tomato pomace presents an alternative to inorganic fertilizer. A field experiment was carried out to evaluate the influence of tomato pomace composts and nitrogen fertilization on agronomic and quality parameters of the processing tomato. The experiment was laid out in a randomized complete block design with three replications and five fertilization treatments (untreated, nitrogen fertilizer, tomato pomace with biocyclic humus soil, tomato pomace with manure and tomato pomace with plant residues). The results showed that the highest average fruit weight and fruit yield (163.4 t/ha) were found in plots subjected to nitrogen fertilization, while the highest total soluble solids content (4.29 °Brix), and L* and a* colour parameters, important quality parameters to processing tomato industry, were obtained through the application of tomato pomace mixed with biocyclic humus soil making organic tomatoes suitable for processing tomato industry.