Domestic problems dog flower production

[rgiridhar]

Ludhiana, Sep 16:

Floriculture in India is being viewed as a high growth industry but export of flowers face infrastructural problems like bad interior road, inadequate refrigertated transport and storage facilites besides domestic marketing problems.

Tedious phytosanitary certification and an unorganised domestic market also hinder exports. There is also a shortage of trained manpower to handle commericial floriculture activity.

While Indian growers have been successful in producing world class quality flowers at lost cost, high air freight rates, low cargo capacity available, imposition of import duties, inadequate export infrastructure etc have reduced their competitiveness, according to a study conducted by Ramandeep Singh, Khushdeep Dhami and Sonika Sharma of the Punjab Agricultural University (PAU).

Floriculture is increasingly regarded as a viable diversification from the traditional crops because of higher returns. Commercial floriculture is important from the export angle and considered as a sunrise industry.

The major importing countries of cut flowers are Netherland, USA, Germany, France, U K, Switzerland, Italy and Japan. The major exporting countries include Netherlands, Columbia, Ecuador, Israel, Spain and Kenya.

Being a major market for floriculture, Netherlands both imports and re-exports the flowers. The most important flowers traded in the international market is still rose but others like chrysanthemum, cornation, gerbera, dahlia, poinsettia, orchids, lily etc are also marketed in large quantities.

According to the study the area under flowers has crossed one lakh hectares in India. Floriculture in India includes traditional flowers such as marigold, jasmine, aster, rose, chrysanthemum, tuberose as well as modern flowers like cornation, gerbera, galdiolus, anthurium.

Refering to the production scenario, the study pointed out that the domestic flower production had shown a growth in the recent past. The country had made noticeable advancement in the production of flowers.

The growing of contemporary cut flowers like rose, gladiolus, tuberrose, cornation, etc had led to their use for bouquests and arragenements of gifts, as well as decoration of both home and work place. A growing market had led to transformation of the activity of flower growing into a burgeoning industry.
The study stated that the agro-climatic conditions in India facilitates production of all major flowers throughout the year in some part or the other. The improved transporation facilities, had increased the availability of flowers all over the country, The study further pointed out that marketing of cut flowers in India was very unorganised at present. In most metropolitan cities, with large market potential, flowers are brought to wholesale markets, which mostly operate in open yards.

A few large flower merchants generally buy most of the produce and distribute it to local retial outlets after significant mark up.
The retail florist shops also usually operate in the open, on road sides, with different flowers arranged in large buckets.
In the metros, however, there are some good florist show rooms, where flowers are kept in controlled temperature conditions, with considerable attention to value added services, the study said.

Floriculture exports from India had increased from Rs 43 crore in 1995-96 to Rs 299.41 crores in 2005-06. Export of floriculture during 2005-06 witnessed a growth of 35.4 per cent over the previous years value of Rs 221.11 crores.