The farmer clusters cultivating flowers under the nationwide “CSIR Floriculture Mission” are reaping benefits through the training provided by CSIR-National Botanical Research Institute (NBRI) of Lucknow. The farmer clusters in the Vidarbha region of Maharashtra are overjoyed with the marigold flowers blossoming on their farms.
More than 192 farmers of 8 clusters in the Vidarbha region alone were provided the marigold saplings in June and July of 2022. Now, after two months, the result has brought smiles on the faces of these farmers who had no work at all, especially the women farmers, informed NBRI’s Maharashtra co-ordinators Dr. Vijay Wagh and Dr. Manish Bhoyar. Not only do they see positive results, but they are also able to sell their produce at the nearby market with increasing demand for flowers due to Ganesh Chaturthi and the recently concluded Maharashtra Pola festival.
Reena Arvind Roy, a farmer from Gondia village in Maharashtra (about 150 km from Nagpur), is selling marigold flowers for ₹100-120 per kg. Along with Reena, 38 other women from her village are growing marigolds. “I’m able to produce 12-13 kgs after a gap of every 2-3 days from my 500 sq. feet land that helps me earn ₹10,000 in a few weeks,” said Reena. Neeru Tai Mandurkar from Bandhya, Maharashtra, is overjoyed to see the results in her 750 sq feet of farmland, and she is cultivating it for the first time.
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