The objective of this work was to evaluate agronomically the system of integrated production (IP) x conventional production (CP) in orchard of peach tree cv. Diamante in the rural area of Pelotas, Rio Grande do Sul State, Brazil. The study was conducted during three years (1999- 2001), in two different areas. The production systems were characterized as: in the CP prevails the handling and cultural practices usually used by the producer and IP is where the defined handling practices are used in the "Norms for Integrated Peach Production". The evaluations were: total production, classification of the fruits, damages, analyses post-harvesting and pesticides residues. The analysis of the production kg/tree and number of fruits/tree demonstrated that the production was larger in IP. The evaluation of the quality of the fruits indicated that there was an increasing in the number of fruits in one category in the system IP. The occurrence of damages in the crop for attack of insects, diseases, birds and a lot of times by the interaction of these was larger in CP. The analysis of pesticides residues in the pulp of the fruits demonstrated that there were not found residues, inside of the maximum established limits. The fruits of the system IP presented, in the crop, a larger firmness of the pulp and acidity and smaller level of soluble solids.
Peach; productive system; quality and residues
