Phytopathological Investigation of Underutilized Fruits in Southern Bangladesh

Abstract

Malnutrition, poor health, hunger, and even starvation are still the world's greatest challenges. In Bangladesh, there is also need to concentration in the underutilized fruits. Thus a survey was carried out following questionnaire to estimate the status of underutilized fruits in Bangladesh under different parameters viz., basic information, production problems, diseases, storage problems, loss percentage, and market value collected from underutilized fruits Ten growers, five shopkeepers and Key Informants, five KIs (Upazila Agriculture Officer) of Khulna, Shatkhira, Bagherhat, Barisal and Patuakhali. Survey finding reveals that the highest number of underutilized fruit trees was possessed by the farmers in Bagherhat (462) and the lowest number of underutilized fruit trees was in Patuakhali (182). Farmers informed five different types of diseases of underutilized fruit trees in their household viz. Leaf blight, Leaf spot, Fruit blight, Leaf curl and Die back which cause damage to plants. Maximum growers from Khulna (80%) informed leaf blight, from Shatkhira (90%) informed leaf spot, from Patuakhali (70%) informed fruit blight, from Bagherhat and Khulna (20%) informed leaf curl and from Barisal (50%) informed die back associated with underutilized fruit tree. There was no leaf curl disease found in Barisal and Patuakhali. Fruit drop problem was found in all the districts. The highest number of growers informed fruit drop problems in Bagherhat (90%). 40% farmers in Barisal found 10-20% loss of production due to disease was highest followed by Patuakhali (30%). 100% shopkeepers of Shatkhira sell Tamarind and Pomegranate, 100% shopkeepers in Khulna sell Pomegranate, 100% shopkeepers of Barisal sell Sapota and 80% shopkeepers in Patuakhali sell Tamarind. Most of the KI informed the similar status of underutilized fruit trees. Farmers in Bagherhat, Shatkhira and Khulna were good in controlling different diseases of underutilized fruits, where Barisal and Patuakhali have lower concept on the diseases of underutilized fruits.