*3.6. Changes in Firmness*

It is clear from Figure 3 and Table S3 that the firmness of kiwifruit (flesh and core) decreased gradually during the cold storage. At harvest, the firmness of flesh (Figure 3a) was not different between treatments, while the firmness of core (Figure 3b) was greatest (*p* ≤ 0.05) in the fruits treated with the preharvest chitosan. Throughout the whole storage, it was apparent that the treatment of chitosan at 100 and 500 mg·L−<sup>1</sup> retained the higher flesh firmness when compared to that of control. Although the mean core firmness in preharvest chitosan-treated kiwifruits were higher than the control, they were not significantly different from the control fruit during the storage.
