Marketing and Production of Fruits and Vegetables in India

India is one of the important fruit and vegetable producing countries in the world. In production, it ranks second after China in the case of both fruits and vegetables. India support more than 17 % of the population with only 2.4 % land share. At the global level, it appears that we are slowly moving towards global food crisis. Recently published special report of UN on the Right to Food estimated that nearly one billion people sleep without food across the world, and among every six seconds a child dies of malnutrition. Over the past few years, horticulture has made remarkable progress in terms of expansion in area and production under different crops, increase in productivity, crop diversification, technological interventions for production and post-harvest and forward linkages through value addition and marketing. Fruits and vegetables account for nearly 90% of the total horticulture production in the country. There are several challenges namely tumultuous weather, seasonal cyclones, occasional drought, demographic pressure, industrialization, urbanization and unprecedented use of pesticides and compulsion for migration of rural masses to urban areas, especially for their livelihood. Albeit, there has been a major change in various sectors of horticulture, which resulted in enhanced production of horticulture recent years. Horticulture is not merely a means of diversification but forms an integral part of food, nutritional security and poverty alleviation, and also an essential ingredient of economic security. India, like many other countries, is very concerned about food security, thus rural development has become primary area of focus in the current agricultural and horticultural development programs.