Like other sectors, horticulture is also grinding from poor storage facilities and a whopping 5.9 crore tones of fruits and vegetables were going wasted every year in India. Well grown horticultural products such as fruits and vegetables failed to give good returns for farmers as most of them get ruined within one or two days of production. Horticulture sector in India is in need of proper cold storage facility.
Happy news is that India is the second largest producer of horticultural products, and it produces 6.8 crore tones of fruits and 12.9 crore tones of vegetables annually. But, more than 30 percent of these products get wasted annually due to lack of proper infrastructure, and only two percent of horticultural produce is being processed in the country now.
As official figure says, the country has an overall cold storage facility of 5,400, of which 4,875 were private units, whereas 400 owned by co-operatives and the remaining 125 belong with public sector. If we took geographical location, more than 50 percent units were in North Indian states such as Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, and West Bengal.
Generally fruits and vegetables are perishable quickly, and can be keeping fresh just for one or two days without cold storage. This could harm as in most of times the farmers were unable to sell their products within this short period due to non availability of markets. Fruits and vegetables are generally cultivated in rural places, and later transported to markets. In India, especially in rural areas roads were in a dilapidated state and farmers have to face hardship to reach market place to sell their products. So in most of times their products would lose their freshness in the mid-way to reach the markets. Even if they able to transport their products at fresh, they have to face hardship to find customers. Usually process takes more time, and meantime they would perish. So farmers in India are not becoming rich even if they have well grown products.
