Uttar Pradesh Minister of Agriculture, Agricultural Education and Research, Surya Pratap Shahi on Tuesday flagged off a referral van loaded with 4 tonnes of Malihabadi Dussehri mangoes to the United States of America from Rahmankheda campus of ICAR Central Institute of Subtropical Horticulture, in the state capital.
This is for the first time that UP is exporting Dussehri mangoes to the US.
On the occasion, Shahi informed about the export target of UP and said that the state government will export one product from each potential district. Malihabadi Dussehri from Lucknow, Chausa of Western region and Langra variety of Purvanchal has already been listed and is being exported.
He expressed happiness over the efforts made by ICAR-CISH in close coordination with exporters and farmers as well as with Central and State agencies.
He appreciated the leadership of Dr T Damodaran on the technologies developed by ICAR-CISH in the direction of increasing the storage capacity and preventing diseases of mango.
State Horticulture minister Dinesh Pratap Singh said that last year Malihabadi Dussehri mango was exported to Moscow. This time, sending such a large consignment to the US for the first time was quite special.
”All this mango was ripened on the tree in paper bags. This year around one crore paper bags have been used in Malihabad. The target for next year is five crore paper bags. The government will support the farmers in this,” he announced.
Agriculture Production Commissioner ( APC) Manoj Kumar Singh said after preliminary discussions with Dr Damodaran, the target of exports from UP to America and Europe is almost certain to be met, and accordingly financial assistance is being provided for the implementation of the schemes.
He also mentioned the lack of radiation treatment facilities in North India and invited Innova Agri Bio Park MD Dr K S Ravi to set up a Food Park/Packing facility at Noida.
The institute aims to send 4 tonnes of mangoes every week from UP to Innova Agri Bio Park, Malur (Karnataka) for radiation treatment, which will then be sent to the US by air.
The institute contacted the UP government, exporters, aggregators and mango growers to implement the schemes.
”MetWash technology was tested on fruits of different varieties of mango procured from different parts of Kerala, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Odisha and UP during April to September 2023 to increase the storage capacity of mango. Using this technology, a consignment of Totapuri mangoes has already been transported to Europe by sea route, and in future, mangoes from UP will be exported using this process,” Manoj Kumar Singh said.