REVIEW article
Front. Food Sci. Technol.
Sec. Food Packaging and Preservation
This article is part of the Research TopicInnovations in Food Packaging to Combat Antimicrobial ResistanceView all articles
Recent advances in active, edible and smart packaging applications to enhance post-harvest quality and shelf-life of fruits
Provisionally accepted
- 1Xiamen University - Malaysia, Sepang, Malaysia
- 2Univerzitet u Beogradu, Belgrade, Serbia
- 3IMU University, Federal Territory of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
- 4UCSI University, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
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Post-harvest fruit losses result in significant waste problem due to the decline in quality by physiological metabolism and unfavorable environmental conditions. To extend shelf life and mitigate waste and environmental impacts, investigations on innovative fruit packaging technologies such as active, edible, biodegradable, and smart packaging are warranted. Active packaging enhances fruit preservation by ethylene scavengers, controlling fungal growth, regulating moisture, and providing antioxidants through bioactive compounds. A growing trend involves edible and biodegradable packaging made from natural polymers (polysaccharides, proteins, and lipids), which prevents physical, mechanical, and microbiological damage to fruits while also serving as a medium for additives like antimicrobials and antioxidants, thus improving freshness and quality. In addition, smart packaging utilizes biosensors, pH indicators, and gas indicators for live monitoring throughout the supply chain and can be united with other packaging technologies to enhance functionality. Current developments concern on the green and hybrid packaging, particularly to unite biodegradable packaging with active and smart packaging to deliver synergistic functionalities. This can preserve the fruits quality while offering active properties or live monitoring while supporting environmental sustainability. This review provides insights on the current advances and potential future development in innovative active, edible, biodegradable, and smart packaging technologies, while also addressing the current challenges associated with these packaging.
Keywords: ethylene, bioactive, coating, Film, biosensor, indicator
Received: 13 Oct 2025; Accepted: 19 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Chan, Kaseke, Chew, Neo and Nyam. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Kar Lin Nyam, nyamkl@ucsiuniversity.edu.my
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