Export competitiveness of Pomegranates from India

Abstract

Pomegranate is an important fruit crop of arid and semiarid regions of the world. In 2021-22, India had an area of 2.7 lakh hectares under pomegranate cultivation with a production of 30.86 lakh metric tonnes and a productivity of 11.4 metric tonnes/ha; 99043.09 tonnes of fresh pomegranates were exported from India to other countries with a value of `688.76 crores. In the present study, export competitiveness of Indian pomegranates was analysed by using nominal protection coefficient (NPC) under the exportable hypothesis for a period of 20 years from 2002-03 to 2021-22. Time series data were collected from the websites of APEDA, NHB and Indiastat. Nominal protection coefficient (NPC) for pomegranates was found to be greater than unity in period I (1.29) while in period II, the NPC was found to be less than unity (0.82). This showed that pomegranates were not export competitive in period I while they were moderately competitive in period II. In the overall period, the NPC value was found to be 0.95 indicating that Indian pomegranates were internationally competitive. Hence, the Government may focus on international relative pricing and formulate targeted strategies to increase domestic pomegranate production through widespread promotion initiatives in the country.