Heavy rainfalls are not new to India and three years ago, a lot of farmers in the Nagpur district lost their crops to water damages. The productivity of oranges and sweet limes plummeted during these periods of heavy rain, so the Indian government decided something needed to be done. A dam was built along the nearby rivers of Narkhed to improve the situation. As a result, crops are now relatively safe and water is available to the farmers throughout the year, as the dam also functions as a water reservoir.
The rain season in India lasts for four months. Heavy rain still occurs every now and then, but because the farmers harvest the crops twice or sometimes even thrice a year, the damages are negligible. The dam was never built before as the rain had never been as severe as it was during the 2013-2014 season.
The dam has allowed Behare’s Orange farms at Narkhed to prosper as they grow oranges and Mosambi (sweet limes) in large quantities; approximately 5 tones/acre. In the Nagpur district the orange market is quite big compared to the other fruits, mostly due to a very high demand. They export to most European countries and American states. The farm is actually willing to expand to more European countries, but would like to lose the need for a broker agency. Dealing direct will generate more income, which will allow for more rapid expansion.
Pralhad Narayanrao Behare takes pride in their produce of oranges: “The sweetness of our oranges make them better than oranges from any other countries. They are bigger in size and contain more juice due to the water availability and a huge amount of quality soil. We have both the natural and hybrid variety of the oranges and sweet limes in big quantities.”
One might think sorting the logistics from a small village in India is problematic, but Behare managed to get some help in this department: “With Narkhed being a small village, for logistics we need to take support from transport industries that include trucking from big cities; generally trucking transport is also available locally to get our products transported for cargo flight loading.”
