Over the last few years, the Indian region of Jhalawar has seen bumper orange crops. A large number of farmers in Bhawanimandi, Pedawa, Sunel, Jhalrapatan, Bakani and Dag areas of the district have been reaping rich rewards.
Oranges are cultivated on about 39,000 hectares of land in Jhalawar district. The plant bears fruits twice in a year; first from October 15 to November 15 and again from February 15 to March 15. An average plant yields about 80 kgs of oranges per season. There are four Farmer Producer Organisations (FPO), a kind of cooperative companies through which the orange cultivators sell their produce.
Processing units and export centers are essential requirements to promote orange cultivation in Jhalawar and the ‘orange excellence centre’ set up by government has proved to be a great help to growers.
The orange growers are however hit hard by ‘back moil’, a kind of disease that inflicts orange plants. The government has come up with awareness generation activities among farmers to prevent disease, district agriculture officer Atish Kumar Sharma said.
