Agriculture forms the backbone of the Indian economy and despite; concerted towards industrialisation for about five decades agriculture still continues to occupy a place of pride. Being the largest industry in the country, agriculture is a source of livelihood for 67.8 per cent of the population in the country. In India, it is not only the main source of livelihood but also an art, tradition and the common way of life. It provides food, raw materials and employment opportunities to a very large portion of the population. Through exporting agricultural commodities, India earns valuable foreign exchange which can be used for importing capital, technical know-how etc.

Quality of fruit is important in export marketing. Quality of fruit depends upon pre and post-harvest technologies used by the farmers. Poor agronomic practices deteriorate fruit quality. Quality can never be improved after harvest. Quality of fruit starts from farmer's planning of pre-harvest practices to that of post-harvest treatments which ends at the consumer level. In pre-harvest practices, selection of seed of exporting variety (propagation) and soil selection is important, and then planting, spacing, irrigation, fertilizer, nutrition, crop protection, pruning, flowering and supervision activities are essentially deal with it. In almost every aspects of pre-harvest technology, lot of science, beginning from land preparation to crop harvesting is involved. All of this must be balanced by a good return from the marketing processes and this can only be achieved by careful production, planning and crop management.

Report with reference to the state of Maharashtra, India.

We all are indebted to nature for providing us food and its resources for our subsistence and survival. In the food domain, cereal and legume grains occupy the front line, whereas, horticultural crops have occupied the second line of defense. For healthy diet cereals and legumes provide us with carbohydrates and protein, whereas, fruits and vegetables provide us minerals and vitamins. Both macro- and micro- nutrients are essential for human growth and development. The fruits and vegetables are the major source of micro-nutrients. It is estimated that up to 2.7 million lives could potentially be saved each year if fruit and vegetable production was sufficiently increased. Both at national and international levels, food and agriculture/horticulture development plans and estimates are basically developed, framed and implemented, and narrowed down to cereal production. In the present context of attaining nutrition security, this mode of thinking on ‘food’ needs to be changed to ‘nutrients’, which will include necessarily all those crops including fruit and vegetables which provide all macro- and micro-nutrients to ensure balanced nutrition needed for good human health. The present publication has attempted to reflect and discuss the above views and ideas on the subject of sustainable horticulture development and nutrition security in nine chapters with 32 articles by 32 authors.

The book provides a factual account of the life, culture and economic progress of the states and union territories, and also their contribution to the development of India as a whole.

In the current scenario, marked by a continual improvement in living standards, it becomes imperative to boost the productivity as well as the efficiency of agriculture, especially horticulture, which holds the potential for significant economic prosperity aligning with Sustainable Development Goal number 8, "Decent Work and Economic Growth". Modern technological interventions, such as geospatial technology and geographic information system (GIS) technology, can be harnessed to yield effective results in addressing challenges and providing enhanced decision support, particularly in the planning of horticultural resource management. Cultivation and production of fresh produce face several challenges, including prolonged juvenile phases and reproductive cycles with extended breeding periods, creating bottlenecks in the process. The evolving trends in biotechnology offer promising solutions for improving the selection of desirable traits. Biotechnological techniques aimed at improving fruit efficiency encompass tissue culture, induction of genetic variability, germplasm conservation, and molecular breeding/genomics. These methods involve the study of genetic diversity, DNA fingerprinting, and Quantitative Trait Loci (QTL) analysis for marker-assisted selection. Over the past few decades, the global population has consistently risen, raising concerns about the ability of the current food system to adequately feed the anticipated 10 billion people in the next 30 years. While this challenge is deemed achievable, certain changes in both food production and consumption systems are essential to ensure sustainability, reduce food loss and waste, and contribute to a global shift toward healthier and more sustainable diets. Implementing sustainable models of crop production represents a significant undertaking. To address the growing food demand amid deteriorating production environments, there is a need for promising technologies and effective management options to enhance productivity. This book is poised to be a valuable resource for horticultural scientists operating in universities, government agencies, and research centers, offering insights into achieving sustainable cultivation practices for fruits. It stands out as the first of its kind, providing in‐depth knowledge on environmentally friendly methods for cultivating temperate fruit crops, to reduce harmful emissions and pollution. This book will delve into the application of geographic information system (GIS) for estimating horticulture area expansion and crop yield. Additionally, it will encompass recent biotechnological interventions in horticulture, circular agriculture models, and emerging non‐thermal food preservation techniques as significant components. Features: Aims to provide a comprehensive and integrated overview of current techno-statistical techniques employed in horticulture, delving into the associated livelihood benefits derived from the practice. Explores the novel geographical trends to identify the site suitability indices of several temperate fruits. Offers a comprehensive and integrated exploration of recent trends in biotechnological approaches aimed at enhancing food production, quality, and safety.

Indian agriculture is currently passing through a period of severe crisis. Although certain features of the crisis such as deceleration in growth rate, declining share of agriculture in GDP and falling public investment in agriculture started manifesting themselves in certain parts of India during the late 1980s, the crisis assumed a serious dimension since the middle of the 1990s. One of the tragic manifestations of the crisis in the large number of suicides committed by the farmers in some parts of India mainly concentrated in Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra.Concerned with farmers suicides, the Hon'ble Prime Minister of India announced a rehabilitation packages on July 1, 2006. The implementation period of the package was fixed at 3 years This book examines the ground reality as to whether the benefits of this package reached the intended beneficiaries in Maharashtra and also the impact of the package on the beneficiates.