Rs 15,000 cr horticulture mission gathers steam

The Rs 15,000 crore horticulture mission is taking big steps ahead with agriculture scientists coming up with dos and dont's for preventing the colossal waste of fruits and vegetables in the country in the absence of value addition and preservation.

India has now emerged as a major producer of horticultural crops and presently produces 50 million tonne of fruits and about 100 million tonne of vegetables.

"We are working on the linkages for intensifying efforts for value addition in fruits and vegetables as part of the horticulture mission," a senior agriculture ministry official said.

The official said the allocations for horticulture development are being disbursed expeditiously and the farmers are being ably guided on measures to boost the quality of their plants.

According to G Kalloo, deputy director general (horticulture and crop science), Central Institute for Subtropical Horticulture in Lucknow, it is important to concentrate on drying, dehydration, bottling and canning among other things.

He said the demand for puree, juice, candy, potato chips, potato wafers, canned beans and frozen peas have grown enormously and the value addition in horticulture will give a boost to the incomes of farmers.

On value additions in mango, Kalloo said rough handling of mango during harvesting results in skin damage that needs to be avoided.

The mango fruits should be harvested with a 8-10 mm stalk with the help of clippers or harvesters developed by the institutes.

The fruits should be harvested usually in the morning hours to avoid heat build up in the fruit pulp, he said in a study brought out by the Indian Council of Agriculture Research.

Stating that the technology for extraction of good quality pectin and edible fibre from mango peel has been developed, Kalloo said approximately 4.5 kg pectin and 2 kg fibre could be obtained from one quintal of peel.

He said good quality vinegar with 4-5 per cent acetic acid having pleasant mango flavour could be prepared from washings of peel and mango stone.

On banana processing, the scientist said a process has been developed for making banana male flower bud pickle and fruits pickle.

He said several banana flour based products have been prepared and recipe developed for promoting commercialisation of banana flour.