Not only growth of Guava orchards has been poor, even most of Rainy Season crop is worm infested

Will SKAUST Scientist take heavily on Fruit Flies to save Rainy season fruit from worms

DAYA SAGAR

Directorate of Horticulture Jammu (Divn) mentions Guava (Amrood ), Orange / Kinoo (citrus), Mango among the ‘fruit crops’ grown/ that can be grown in Districts of Jammu (sub tropical) , Kathua (sub tropical, intermediate temperate), Samba (sub tropical, *no mention of mango), Udhampur (sub tropical, intermediate temperate), Reasi ( sub tropical, temperate ), Ramban (sub tropical, intermediate temperate, *no mention of mango ),Poonch (sub tropical, intermediate temperate , *no mention of mango ) and Rajouri (sub tropical, intermediate temperate).But in reference to these fruits it will not be wrong to mention here that bulk of these fruits consumed in Jammu Division ( particularly improved commercial varieties ) are imported from other states ( even Punjab and also from Himachal Pradesh).

Guava is imported to J&K in very large quantities and during this July month it is being sold in retail atleast from Rs.70 to 120 per Kg. Not only that whatever indigenous varieties / others varieties of Guava are grown in Jammu Division it is a common acknowledged fact that the fruit that matures ( July/ August) is infected with worms ( commonly named as Fruit Fly ) at places even more than 75% fruit of rainy season crop is lost and common advice is that summer flowering of guava should be better shed off.
On the one hand the development of Horticulture in Jammu Division has been very poor ( could well be assessed from the quantities imported even of Guava / Mango/ Orange) and to add to that whatever plantation is there that too is not well protected from worms/ insects of which Guava fruit plantation is the worst victim even nearly after 7 decades of Independence and there being a separate Directorate of Horticulture for Jammu Division as well as a University of Agriculture & Technology ( Sher e Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology Jammu – SKAUST).
Actual data for 2021 – 2022 on production and export / import of fruits to / from Jammu Division could not be obtained therefore for idea sake , particularly for Guava , some data on area ( hectares) under Guava and production ( metric tons) for 2015 -16 ( Area: 2463.84 Hect and Production :3275.50 Mt ) and 2016-17 ( Area :2478.99 Hect and Production : 3495 Mt ) as could be obtained from some earlier publications can be taken to get the likely status of Guava as Horticulture crop of Jammu Division of J&K. So that way production per hectare ( 20 Kanals) orchard could be around 1,3Mt (13 Quintal ) to 1.4 Mt (14 Quintal) or in other words just 65 kg to 70 Kg per Kanal ( data is subject to correction on availability .of actual data on date from departmental sources for which request has been made ). At one place Jammu Division Guava area and production for 2019 -20 has been mention as 2541 Hect and 8391 Mt i.e around 165 kg per kanal which show some increase over 2016-17 but is still very low. No doubt the data for 2022-23 could be even higher but going by the status of the quantity of rainy season crop available in the Jammu market from local production there may not be a status worth appreciation better than one assessed here in.
To be brief there is utmost need for raising the priority level of approach towards development of commercial horticulture in Jammu Division for fruits like Guava and in the modern era of technologies the problem of the rainy season guava crop infestation should not have been so acute that almost whole any season crop is lost in most of the cases and some where some crop is sent to the market before it matures. People in J&K have not been that much motivated or encouraged over the years for taking to commercial fruit production like even in neighboring states and above that there has been under rated support / initiatives from the government agencies and less targeted approach from research departments of the Agriculture University like that for even disease/ insect control for cultivation of fruits like Guava otherwise may be even if 75% of rainy season Guava fruit would have been saved from worms some cultivators on their own might have taken for commercial guava farming.

(The writer is a Sr Journalist, analyst J&K affairs and Social Activist).