Vegetable research in India: An overview

Vegetable production has made spectacular progress in recent years in India and touched a new height. Due to advent of hybrid varieties and increasing awareness about nutritional security, vegetable production is gaining continuous momentum in our country. In spite of the stride progress, per capita consumption of vegetable in India is only about 210 g/day/person, which is far below the minimum dietary requirement of 300g/day/person. Forty per cent of the world's malnourished children are in India and 60 per cent of Indian women are anaemic. Vegetables possess tremendous medicinal and nutritive values, there exists an enormous potentiality in vegetable technologies in India to address the micronutrient malnutrition, often called "hidden hunger". Vegetable being a rich and cheap source of vitamin and mineral, occupy an important place in the food dishes of Indian consumers, a majority of the population of the country is vegetarian. About more than 70 type of vegetable are grown, higher emphasis has been given to popular vegetables like tomato, brinjal, chilli, okra, pea, cowpea, french bean, cauliflower, cabbage, onion, garlic, cucurbits, carrot, radish and leafy vegetables etc.