Breeding of Fruit and Plantation Crops

History of fruit research

 
• Fruit research in India was started at the Departments of botany in six Agricultural Colleges established in 1905 at Pune, Coimbatore, Lyallpur, Nagpur, Sabour and Kanpur. Almost at the same time, the Imperial Agricultural Research Institute was set up at Pusa (Bihar) and the Provincial and Central Departments of Agriculture were organized which were to look after the work on horticultural crops.


• At that time, the responsibility of research on fruit crops was mainly of the State Governments. During this period, some of the European settlers like Lee in Kullu Valley, Coutts and Stokes in Shimla hills and some European Missionaries in South India introduced new varieties of fruit crops from UK, France and East Indies etc. A pomological Station was established at Coonoor near Ooty in 1920 to study the adaptability of temperate fruit varieties.


• The initiative by the Imperial Council of Agricultural Research to provide financial assistance to the Provincial Governments in the year 1929 gave considerable boost to research activities. Several schemes were sanctioned to the State Governments to carryout work on important problems. E.g. Citrus dieback, fruit preservation, nutritional value of fruits and control of pests such as San Jose scale of temperate fruits.