Ishwori P. Gautam, Suprabha Pandey, Surendra L. Shrestha, Dipendra Ghimire, Mira Dhakal

Horticulture Research Division, Khumaltar, Lalitpur

Corresponding author's email: ishworigautam@gmail.com

Abstract

Horticulture has been recognized as an important sector for reduction of poverty and increase the income. It contributes 38.59 % in AGDP, of which 20.48% contribution is coming from vegetables. The recent trend of import of fresh vegetables is increased by 15% by volume and 19% by values. The major constraints of low production of vegetables are small scale farm, use of traditional technologies and lack of improved varieties. The main objective of this paper is to document the recent technologies and varietal improvement in vegetable crops. School gardens technology are more effective at influencing nutrition (+26%), healthy food practices (+5%) and vegetable consumption (+15-26%). Modified atmosphere packaging (MAP) in perforated 25-50 microns thick low density polyethylene (LDPE) was found effective for enhancing the self-life of tomato. Calcium chloride treatment of cucumber and carrot was found effective for increasing the storage life. Pot in pot storage, Evaporative cooling (EC) storage and Coolbot storage are cost effective and increase the shelf life of cauliflower (15 days), cabbage (15 days), carrot (21 days) and capsicum (30 days). One variety of cucumber Bhaktapur Local has been released. Two open pollinated varieties of French bean and Asparagus bean have also been registered. Nine F1 hybrids in different crops have been recently registered by this Division. Ramechhap Hariyo amaranth has been registered for dry season. One variety of Kang Kong and one Baitadi Local variety of onion have been proposed for registration. HRDRAD002 (63.7 t/ha) and HRDRAD005 (60.9 t/ha) of radish, AVON1027 (38.83 t/ha) of onion, HRDCAP004 and HRDCAP001 of capsicum has been found promising.

Keywords: Cultivars, Fruit crops, NARC, Post-harvest management, Registration, Recent technology