India's litchi production likely to rise by 15%

Consumers of litchi will have it good this year as production of the important sub-tropical evergreen fruit is expected to see a rise by about 15% during the period on back of favourable climatic condition.

Grown in 71,878 hectares of land across the country, 423 tonnes of litchi was produced in India last year, according to National Horticulture Board (NHB), set up by the central government in 1984 as an autonomous society.

"The recent mild rainfall and balanced temperature will result in an increase of litchi production by about 15% this year," National Research Centre (NRC) for Litchi Director Vishal Nath said. Set up in 2001, NRC is an arm of ICAR (Indian Council for Agricultural Research). 

Nath cited good flowering on litchi trees in support of his optimism. 

Bihar is the leading producer of litchi contributing 74% of the country's production. And within the state, Muzaffarpur is the epicentre of litchi cultivation due to which it is popularly called as "Litchi district".

The state with 30,600 hectare of land under litchi had produced 215 tonnes of the fruit in 2009-10. Shahi and China are the two popular varieties of litchi grown in the district.

Besides a good domestic markets in Delhi, Bangalore, Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata, Muzzafarpur litchi has export markets in gulf, Bangladesh and Nepal. West Bengal, Uttarakhand, Tripura and Assam are other litchi producing states.

Litchi cultivation in Bihar had seen a drop last year due to bad climatic condition, Nath added. Harvesting of litchi will begin from May 15 in Bihar and will continue till first week of June, the NRC Director said. 

He said the fruit starts maturing first in Tripura, followed by West Bengal and then Bihar.

Besides, favourable climate, the litchi cultivation is set to see a rise because of 'GAP' (good agricultural practices) propagated by the scientists of NRC to the farmers, Nath said.

He said the centre is working on "modified atmospheric packaging" to enhance shelf-life of the perishable crop. 

"Due to unscientific packaging of the fruit presently, litchi does not last for more than four days. But, after the modified atmospheric packaging, its shelf-life can be prolonged to 15 days," Nath said.