Economics Of Entrepreneurial Opportunities In Floriculture

Floriculture is emerging as an important commercial crop sector in India from the point of view of both domestic and foreign markets. Demand for floricultural products is steadily increasing both in the domestic as well as export markets. The industry is gaining prominence from three broad counts: creating more employment, ensuring higher incomes to rural people and earning more foreign exchange. India is the second largest producer of flowers after China. According to National Horticulture Board (NHB), area under floriculture at all India level had increased from 53,000 hectares in 1993-94 to 2,48,000 hectares in 2015-16. The compound annual growth rate (CAGR) for the area was 7.66 per cent, while the CAGR of production of loose and cut flowers were 9.44 per cent and 23.10 per cent, respectively. The proportion of the area under high-tech floriculture to the total floriculture area is 70 per cent in Netherlands and 90 per cent in Colombia, whereas in India it is hardly 500 hectares accounting for just 0.56 per cent of the total area under floriculture, while the rest is under traditional flowers. In India, nearly 77 per cent of area under floricultural crops is concentrated in eight states viz., Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Maharashtra, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, and Delhi. India has a scope to bridge the gap between demand and supply, as global demand of floricultural products is growing at a faster rate. India is enriched with diverse agro-climatic conditions such as, fertile land, suitable climate, abundant water supply, low labour cost, availability of skilled manpower etc. which are quite beneficial for growing a variety of flower plants throughout the year. Floricultural crops are highly labour intensive and in a country like India floriculture as an industry has tremendous potential for generation of gainful employment in rural as well as urban areas.

This book highlights the close interactions between plants, plant knowledge, politics, and social life in Padua during the age of revolution. It explores the lives and thoughts of two brothers, the lawyer Andrea Meneghini and the botanist GiuseppeMeneghini, illustrating the unspoken dreams of progress and a new social order, but also sheds light on the ambiguous relationship between the Paduan elite and Austrian rule before the 1848 revolution. A closer look at park designs, gardening associations and networks, fl ower exhibitions, agricultural societies, organicist metaphors, and botanical research on the organization of living bodies opens up unexpected parallels between actors and ideas of two apparently distant areas: botany and political economy.

The breadth of this work will allow the reader to acquire a comprehensive and panoramic picture of the nature of innovation within a single handbook.

Orchids account for a large share of global floriculture trade both as cut flowers and as potted plants, and are estimated to comprise around 10% of international fresh cut flower trade. The average value of fresh cut orchids and buds trade during 2007-2012 was US$ 483 million. In 2012, there are more than 40 countries exporting orchids and 60 countries importing orchids around the world, with the total size of the global trade equaling US$ 504 million. In India, about 1350 species belonging to 186 genera represent approximately 5.98% of the world orchid flora and 6.83% of the flowering plants in India. The publication on “Commercial Orchids” is presented in 15 interesting chapters vividly highlighting the global orchid industry, bio-diversity, conservation and bio-piracy of genetic resources, morphological and molecular characterization of valuable species, breeding approaches for improved genotypes, production of quality planting materials, physiology of tropical and temperate orchids, climate change and its impact on orchid productivity, production technology of commercial epiphytic orchids for cut flower, production technology of commercial terrestrial orchids for cut flower, orchids for pot culture, hanging baskets and tree mounting, medicinal and aromatic orchids, post-harvest management of cut flowers of commercial orchids, value addition and marketing.