Saffron Wave

A change is brewing across Assam’s farms. The state’s farmers...

A change is brewing across Assam’s farms. The state’s farmers, who for long shunned the idea of multiple cropping and stuck to rice and tea, are taking to orange cultivation in a big way.

Over 7,300 hectares are currently under orange cultivation, with the annual production this year estimated to be about 82,000 tonnes, according to officials in the Horticulture Department. A number of orange orchards have come up in the past few years under various government schemes.

In 2000, a special project to cultivate organic oranges was taken up on 2,000 hectares

at Khetri and Sonapur on the outskirts of Guwahati. The project was supported by the North Eastern Council (NEC) and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s MPLAD fund.

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Over 300 villagers at Sonapur are already beginning to export their produce to Bangladesh. “The total volume of export may not be very big but Sonapur orange is fast emerging as a brand name,” said an official.

It also helps that these oranges are organic. “Assam’s oranges—for that matter most other crops—are organic by default because farmers barely use chemical fertilisers,” says Harsha Jyoti Baruah, director, Horticulture Department. “However, such naturally organic items are yet to be certified organic. But that’s not a problem because we have a huge market outside the region,” said Baruah.

Such is the bumper harvest this year that farmers from the Kakopathar-Pengeri area in Tinsukia district of Upper Assam as well as those in Udalguri district are facing a problem despatching their produce to the markets.

“Assam produces some of the best varieties of oranges. But farmers suffer heavy post-harvesting losses since there are not enough processing units,” said Bidyut Kumar Baruah, regional manager (Northeast), Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA).

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Barely 10-20 per cent of the oranges produced in Assam go to the food processing industry, with more than 80 per cent going to markets as fresh fruit.

Now the state Horticulture Department has taken up a joint project with APEDA to train farmers in reducing the post-harvest losses in orange orchards, Bidyut Kumar Baruah said. “There is a tremendous scope for value addition to Assam’s oranges. Also, farmers will earn better if more oranges can be channelised to the food processing sector,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Directorate of Horticulture has taken up a project to introduce water-holding granules, popularly known as ‘raindrop’, in the orange orchards of Assam. A German technology, the water-holding granules help to retain water during dry seasons.

Over 5,000 orange growers of the state will soon be covered under a rejuvenation programme. “Orange growers are being specifically targeted under this programme for extension of support in various areas, including planning and weeding, nutrition management, pest and disease management, application of plant growth regulators and micro-nutrients,” said Baruah.