MEDICINAL AND AROMATIC CROPS (2+1)

Description of the plant

French jasmine is a climbing shrub, but is trained into bushes under cultivation. It has compound opposite leaves, made up of 7-11 leaflets. It produces bisexual flowers in first year of planting. Because of its heterogamous nature of flowers there is no setting of seed. Therefore, it is raised through stem-cuttings. The flower buds do not emit any fragrance. But on opening in early morning, the petals emit fragrance. They continue to give out sweet, pleasing aroma for about 16hr after plucking. The oil evaporates fast in sunlight. Photo courtesy: L.Hegde

Area and production
Tamil Nadu leads in production of J. grandiflorum with an estimated area of 2000 hectares.