Sign In
Learn bits
Schemes & Policies
Mahesh

15/08/24 10:27 AM IST

Centre’s Clean Plant Programme

In News
  • The Union Cabinet recently approved the Clean Plant Programme (CPP), aimed at increasing the yield and productivity of horticulture crops in India.
About CPP
  • The programme has three main components geared towards helping farmers obtain virus-free, high-quality planting material (plants used for vegetative propagation) in order to increase crop yields and improve income opportunities.
  • These are: Development of nine Clean Plant Centers (CPCs) which will provide disease diagnostics and therapeutics, create mother plants to be sent to nurseries, and quarantine all domestic and imported planting materials intended for commercial propagation and distribution;
  • Enhancement of infrastructure, including the development of large-scale nurseries to facilitate the efficient multiplication of clean planting material — the mother plants obtained from the CPCs will be multiplied in nurseries and distributed to farmers;
  • Creation of regulatory and certification process to ensure thorough accountability and traceability in the production and sale of planting material.
Need for CPP
  • India is the second largest producer of fruits and vegetables in the world after China.
  • From 2013-14 to 2023-24, the area under horticulture crops has risen from 24 million hectares to 28.63 million hectares, and production has increased from 277.4 million metric tonnes (mt) to 352 million mt.
  • India is also a major importer and exporter of fresh fruits. In the financial year 2023-24, India exported fresh fruits worth $1.15 billion, while it imported fruits worth $2.73 billion.
  • With the rising consumption of fruits in the country, demand has specifically increased for planting materials of foreign apples, and “exotics” such as avocado and blueberry.
  • According to sources, between 2018-20, the EXIM committee for import of planting material of fruit plants permitted the import of 21.44 lakh apple plants in 2018, which increased to 49.57 lakh in 2020.
  • In 2018, permission was given to import only 1,000 avocado plants which increased to 26,500 in 2020.
  • Similarly, permissions for the import of blueberry plants went up from 1.55 lakh in 2018 to 4.35 lakh in 2020.
  • At present, the process of importing plants is very cumbersome, with imported plants having to be kept in quarantine for two years.
  • The CPCs will cut this period down to six months, and thus make it easier for farmers to access disease free and genuine planting material for horticultural crops in India.
  • The concept of CPCs is on the lines of projects in countries like the US, Israel, and the Netherlands.
Source- Indian Express

More Related Current Affairs View All

05 Mar

First-ever comprehensive survey of India’s river dolphins

'Prime Minister Narendra Modi released the results of the first-ever comprehensive population estimation of riverine dolphins – Gangetic and Indus dolphins – done in In

Read More

05 Mar

Arresting women at night

'The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court in Deepa versus S. Vijayalakshmi and Others ruled that the legal provision in the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), 2023, which

Read More

05 Mar

Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023

'The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) looking to wrap up public consultations on the draft Rules for the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 by Mar

Read More

India’s First Ai-Driven Magazine Generator

Generate Your Custom Current Affairs Magazine using our AI in just 3 steps