High-yielding varieties of onion, garlic launched

Tribune News Service
Karnal, July 10

Scientists of the National Horticulture Research and Development Foundation (NHRDF) have developed two high-yielding and short-duration varieties — one each of onion and garlic — to meet their increasing demand in the country and also to enhance the profit of farmers.

G-404, also known as Yamuna Purple-10, is a variety of garlic, while 819 is an onion variety. Both the varieties were released last week in Delhi during a meeting of the All-India Network Research Programme of Onion and Garlic.

India is the second largest producer of onion in the world after China. Presently, India is producing 220.21 lakh tonnes of onion on 13.15 lakh hectares with the productivity of 25 tonnes per hectare. With the productivity of 5.2 tonnes per hectare, the country is producing 11.8 lakh tonnes of garlic on 2.27 lakh hectares in the country, said Dr BK Dubey, deputy director, NHRDF.

He said G-404 garlic is purple in colour. Maharashtra, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh are big markets for purple colour garlic. The deputy director said, “It is richer in micro-nutrients compared to the normal variety. It is bigger in size as the bulb is between 4.5 and 5 cm compared to the bulb of the normal variety which is between 2.5 and 3 cm.”

About the yield, he said, “It produces between 175 and 200 quintal per hectare while the normal variety’s production is between 140 and 150 quintal per hectare. It gets ready in 160-165 days compared to 175-180 days of the normal variety.”