Peppers: Vegetable and Spice Capsicums, 2nd edition, by Paul W. Bosland and Eric J. Votava. Crop Production Science in Horticulture Series 22. Wallingford, UK, CABI, 2012. 248 pp, £45.00/US$85.00/€60.00 (paperback). ISBN 9781845938253
The genus Capsicum was one of the earliest crops to be domesticated in the New World and introduced to Europe by Columbus. He is also credited for creating the misnomer, by naming the new plant ‘pepper’, simply because it was as pungent as black pepper, Piper nigrum, from the Piperaceae of the Old World. This misnomer is carried forward in the title and throughout this book. The authors clarified this in the extension to the title, reflecting the history of this ancient crop. Discussing one of the most widely cultivated vegetable and spice crops worldwide and a major constituent in food products, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics, this book, covering many general aspects of capsicum, will be welcomed by many growers, extension workers, food technologists and students as well as the general public with an interest in agriculture or food. Therefore, it is timely that a revised second edition of the book has been published. Although the organisation of the book remains unchanged from that of the first edition, the authors have revised this second edition by the inclusion of new published knowledge, as seen from more than 100 publications cited that appeared after 2000. The references to the classical memoirs of pre-Columbian Spanish explorers as well as more recent key publications used in the original edition have been retained. The book provides a good introduction and an overview of capsicum taxonomy, botany, production in both open fields and in greenhouses, and its value as a food crop. It also covers the many problems that growers have to deal with, arising from both environmental and biotic factors.
The book is divided into 10 chapters. In the introduction, the authors review the history of the crop from domestication to current production trends, ethnobotany, nutritional value and its medicinal uses. The current production trends given in the first two tables show the importance of capsicum even now in its centre of origin, and beyond, in Asia, Europe and Africa. Since the publication of their original book, the authors note a 53% increase in production worldwide, further justifying this second revised edition. With 32 wild and five cultivated species and many morphological types, as expected from its long history of domestication, taxonomy of capsicum is complicated and confusing. Two basic chromosome numbers within the genus confound these issues and the authors rightly point out the need to realign the taxonomy of the genus. The incredible complexity and diversity of the genus, due to at least five species in cultivation, has been professionally dealt with from a horticultural perspective in a section separate from a discussion of breeding. Unfortunately, the authors use the term pod to describe the capsicum fruit, which is botanically not correct. A solanaceous fruit is a berry, whereas Fabaceae fruit is classified as a pod. The genetic resources section has been updated, but the link given to the USDA collection on page 37 unfortunately has a typographical error. There is only a passing mention of the AVRDC global collection.
Considering the value of seeds in capsicum production, a separate chapter with seeds as the main theme is justified, and the sections on pollination, seed treatments and priming give valuable information for seed producers. Hybrid seed production is discussed separately. As in many other crops, the astounding rate of advancement of biotechnology research in capsicum cannot be covered in a book with a broad theme such as this. Therefore, the authors have kept this aspect very general, to allow horticulturists and enthusiasts a basic understanding of this fast-developing area of science. Students or researchers who need detailed information specific to capsicum biotechnology should refer to more specialised texts elsewhere. In contrast, the chapter on chemical composition is quite informative, covering the many compounds in the fresh and processed product as well as a good coverage of capsaicinoids, the unique compounds giving the pungency to capsicum fruit.
Virtually every disease and pest that infects capsicum is listed, with some of the control measures.
The chapters devoted to cultivation and harvesting are mainly accounts of intensive production methods as practiced in the United States, where the authors’ experience lies. This also applies to the postharvest handling described. These accounts will be useful even for growers and processors in developing countries who plan to intensify their processes, for example, for the export market. Unfortunately, these chapters have not received much attention in the revision; for example, greenhouse production and export statistics for 1995 for the Netherlands are discussed in detail; many references cited in the text have not been included in the list of references; plant spacing for field production is discussed in two separate sections titled ‘seeding levels’ and ‘plant spacing’; and the information given in the section on disease in the production chapter is repeated in the last chapter also.
This book will be a valuable addition to the literature on capsicum, with a strong focus on US production, although the price is slightly high for a soft-cover edition with no colour plates.
R Pathirana
Senior Scientist, New Zealand Institute for Plant
& Food Research Ltd
Email: [email protected]
© 2013 R Pathirana