India’s Banana Export Increases Tenfold in a Decade with UP Farmers Benefited The Most

In what is  inspiring, India has witnessed a tenfold rise in exports of bananas in the past decade. This has been revealed by a recent report on export statistics and future projections released by the “Ministry of Commerce and Industry.”

Yogi Adityanath govt, with its  farmer-centric vision, has been proactive in promoting banana cultivation while declaring it as the One District One Product (ODOP) for Kushinagar. This provides  benefits for banana growers in UP (Uttar Pradesh) as they are incentivized by providing subsidies aiming to cultivate high-quality bananas that meet market demands.

In UP's Purvanchal and Awadh regions, districts like Kushinagar, Deoria, Gorakhpur, Maharajganj, Basti, Sant KabirNagar, Ayodhya, Ambedkar Nagar, Amethi, and Barabanki see farmers to get extensively engaged in banana farming.

Over the past decade and a half banana cultivation has steadily increased. Additionally, application of  superior varieties and advanced farming techniques improved yield and quality.

As a result, bananas from UP are in high demand, not only in major cities across the country but also in states like Bihar, Punjab, Delhi, and Jammu, as well as in Nepal.
UP government provides a subsidy of approximately Rs 38,000 per hectare for banana farming.

Furthermore, farmers are being trained to process bananas into other products, such as fruit-based items, fibre, and juice from the stem.

Banana farmers  are also being provided exposure opportunities, for example  a few farmers from Kushinagar participated in a trade show held in Noida a few months ago.
Additionally, for securing maximum benefits for India's banana farmers, the Modi govt has proposed to organise a seller-buyer meet in Mumbai.