'Exotic' vegetable demand increasing in India

Over 28,000 square meters of farmland in Goa, India, will be covered with exotic (by India standards) vegetables such as lettuce and broccoli and nontraditional greens like capsicum during 2014-15.

The number of proposals put forward to the agriculture department to construct greenhouses with state assistance for growing of such exotic vegetables have shot up from an average of seven over the last couple of years to over 40 this year.

Under the scheme for protected cultivation of flowers and vegetables, the state agriculture department provides up to 90 percent assistance to set up the polyhouses or greenhouses, of which 50 percent assistance comes through the central government. Setting up of polyhouses can cost over 2,000 per square meters. But this scheme had not been able to garner much interest from farmers until this year, as farmers feel the demand for exotic vegetables has gone up like never before.

For more: The Times of India