Fruit & Vegetable

1

Fruits & Vegetables Sector :

An Overview

Itouto

nrdcin

ndia is the second largest producer of fruits & vegetables in the world with an

I

annual production of around 94 million tonnes. It has the distinction of producing

almost all-tropical and exotic fruits and vegetables because of varied climatic

conditions. Due to the short shelf life of these crops, as much as 30-35% of fruits and

vegetables perish during harvest, storage, grading, transport, packaging and

distribution. Only 2% of these crops are processed into value-added products. Hence,

there is a need for maximum commercial utilisation of fruits and vegetables and to

adapt production and marketing activities to the requirements of the world market

and to cater to domestic demand which, over the past few years, has been increasing

because of various socio-economic factors. If the nutritive value of the processed food

products could be maintained, this sector will emerge as a major value-added food

industry.

Fruits and vegetables are processed into a variety of products such as juices and

concentrates, pulp, canned and dehydrated products, jams and jellies, pickles and

chutneys etc. The extent of processing of fruits and vegetables varies from one country

to another. The estimated processing capacity as a percentage of production for some

of the major countries is given in Annexure 1.

1

Fruits & Vegetables Sector : An Overview

Historically speaking, processing of fruits & vegetables in

the simplest form like pickling, sun-drying and/or making

preserves has been practised in the country from very

ancient times almost in every home. Since then it has been

progressing fairly well and has been meeting the entire local

demand and has successfully entered the exports market.

In fact, India is the second largest producer of fruit and

vegetables in the world. Total area under fruit and

vegetable cultivation is estimated at 12 mn hectares, which

is 7% of total cropped...