Guwahati: Assam government is focussing on increasing fruit cultivation to make the state a major production and export hub in this sector. The state government has taken the inititative to introduce new varieties of crops, increase crop area and has set up a centre of excellence for orange at Boko for the purpose, Minister for Agriculture, Horticulture and Food Processing Nilamani Sen said today.
“Our effort is to make Assam a major hub of fruit production and export. For that, we are focussing on both increasing the area under fruit cultivation and increasing productivity, besides introducing new varieties and giving incentives to farmers,” Deka said. A plan has been formulated to increase the area under fruit cultivation from 1.4 lakh hectares in 2012-13 to 1.6 lakh hectares by the end of 12th Five Year Plan in 2016-17.
Besides, it has also set a target of increasing annual fruit production from 17.7 lakh mt in 2012-13 to 21.1 lakh mt in 2016-17, and productivity from 12,625 kg per hectare to 13,200 kg per hectare during this period.
Among the new varieties of fruits being introduced are TC G-Narine (banana) from Israel, Red Lady (papaya) from Taiwan, TC MD-2 (pineapple) from Thailand, Lalit and Sardari (guava), Khasi Mandarin and Kinnow (orange), Grafted Amrapalli and Alfonso (mango) and also new varieties of lemon.
Additional Chief Secretary and Agricultural Production Commissioner V K Pipersenia said that tender had been already floated for construction of the Centre for Excellence at Boko which was being set up with the Centre’s assistance on 80 bighas of agricultural land and would concentrate on orange cultivation. (PTI)