The horticultural sector covers six categories, namely pomology (fruits), olericulture (vegetables), floriculture (flowers), plantation crops, spices, aromatics and herbal medicines.
IMPORTANCE
- High value crops due to higher demand from consumers due to greater awareness of nutritional benefits.
- Higher returns per unit of land as compared to cereal crops and hence beneficial for small and marginal farmers. - Replacing 1 hectare of staple crops with horticultural crops increases annual income by Rs 80,000. (Dalwai Panel)
- Ensures Nutritional security by overcoming vitamin and micronutrient deficiencies
- Being labour intensive, generates more employment opportunities.
- Boosts secondary agriculture by developing cottage-based Industries.
PRESENT STATUS OF HORTICULTURE: India is the second largest producer of fruits and vegetables globally; second largest producer and exporter of Spices. Occupying only about 14 per cent of agricultural land, horticulture contributes more than 33 per cent to the agricultural GVA.
Area: 25 Mha; Production: 300 MT; Contribution to Agri-GDP: 33%; Productivity: 12.5 tones/ha (Food grains- 2.25 tones/ha)
GOVERNMENT INITIATIVES
Mission for Integrated Development of Horticulture (MIDH): High density plantations, protected cultivation, micro-irrigation, quality planting material, rejuvenation of senile orchards, and post-harvest management and marketing.
CHALLENGES IN HORTICULTURE
- Higher Capital requirements
- Longer sowing to harvest cycle for some of the fruits such as Apple, Guava etc.
- Large scale prevalence of old and senile orchards impacts productivity. Majority of the orchards also have low planting density.
- Availability of quality seed and planting material impacts quality of produce.
- Poor tree canopy management.
- Rainfed cultivation, with majority of the horticultural cultivation having no access to irrigation.
- Initial cost constraints in adoption of improved technologies.
- Facilities for post-harvest management have not kept pace with production growth.
- Unorganised supply chain not suitably integrated for managing perishable produce.
- Lack of appropriately trained extension services for horticulture.
STRATEGY TO BOOST HORTICULTURAL PRODUCTION
- Increasing the output through higher productivity
- Hybrid technology for high productivity and quality- Hybrids of tomato, chilli, cucumber and muskmelon
- Quality planting material and seed production- Creation, modernisation and accreditation of nurseries
- High density planting system- higher yield and net economic returns per unit area, more efficient use of inputs
- Increasing the output through area expansion such as Integrated Farming system approach, Urban & Peri-urban Horticulture
- Resource use efficiency or savings in cost of production through micro-irrigation, fertigation, adoption of mechanisation to reduce labour costs
- Increase in cropping intensity by enhancing Irrigation, Crop Rotation, Mixed Cropping etc.
- Diversification towards high value crops within horticulture such as floriculture, cashew, Cocoa, mushrooms, spice and medicinal plant cultivation
- Improvement in the market access and marketing system
- Creation of near-farm occupations in post-harvest handling facilities
HORTICULTURE PLUS
Horticulture is considered as high value agriculture. However, within the horticultural sector, there are specific crops that can be considered as “Horticulture Plus”. These include flowers, cashew, cocoa, mushrooms, spices and aromatics, etc.
PRESENT STATUS
Floriculture: Important agribusiness with immense potential for generating self-employment and entrepreneurship among small and marginal farmers in both urban and rural areas. Though, India dominates in terms of area under cultivation, yet India’s yield per hectare is low. As a result, India’s contribution to the global floricultural export market is very minimal.
Spices: India is the largest producer, consumer and exporter of spices and spice products in the world. As the global demand for the spices grow, farmers should diversify into high-value-plus crops like saffron, cardamom, turmeric, chillies, ginger and vanilla beans.
Cashew and Cocoa: Cashew is grown in number of states such as Kerala, Karnataka, Goa, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh etc. Cashew improves the farm income and sustains employment for 1.5 million people in the cashew farming. Cultivation of cocoa is gaining momentum and is grown in states such as Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh. India imports around 60% of the demand for Cocoa.