Saturday

MARKET ANALYSIS AND STRATEGY 

 EXPORTS/IMPORTS TRENDS:
             India exports pomegranate mainly to Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia, U.A.E., Netherlands etc.  Varieties which are in demand internationally include Ganesh and Aarakta.  The trend in export of pomegranate.

India: only 50% of pomegranates suitable for export
Tholen - On the European markets, pomegranates from India are very expensive at the moment. The prices are much higher than last year, because there is a shortage on the market. It is suggested that lots of pomegranates are infected with an unknown disease and that because of this only 50% of the total pomegranate production in India is suitable for export. There are coming less pomegranates to Europe and not all pomegranates exported to Europe are allowed on the European market, because they don't match the European standards about pesticides. The increasing knowledge of the consumer about the health benefits of pomegranates has caused a serious increase in the demand for pomegranates and because of this the prices are skyrocketing.


  ANALYSIS AND STRATEGY:
Development of infrastructure facilities for transport to primary markets, standardization of packaging techniques are aspects which need special attention.  Processing facilities also need to be created in the major producing states for value addition.

POMEGRANATE CULTIVATION AND GROWING METHODS
ANNUAL/PERRENIAL PLANT: Perennial
PARTS USED: Fruit and seeds.
SUN REQUIREMENTS:
This fruit grows best in full-sun and warmth, although it can be grown in partial shade. The shrub is also fairly drought tolerant.
HEIGHT:
 A growing Zones 7-10. Grows wild in Northern India, southern Europe and California.
FLOWERING/SEEDING TIME
Yearly flowers and seeds during spring time, after three years of growth.
DRYING METHODS / YIELD:
Best fresh or in extract form.
PRESERVATION / PACKAGING METHODS:
The raw fruit can be preserved and stored for a long time if refrigerated.
ESSENTIAL OIL USE:
Pomegranate oil is very rare and unique. The oil is used mostly for aromatherapy and has an exotic, fruity aroma. It has restorative, antioxidant properties on the skin, and has been shown in laboratory tests to fight both skin and breast cancer.
PLANT CHEMICALS:
High in plant phenols (antioxidants), and the ellagitannins punicalagins and punicalin, as well as gallic and ellagic acids.
CAUTIONS / CONTRAINDICATIONS:
Generally, pomegranate fruit and juice are completely safe, in moderate amounts. Despite the potential health benefits, it would be wise to talk to your healthcare provider if you plan on taking large amounts of the juice or supplements, especially if you have low blood pressure, allergies, are pregnant, or if you are breast-feeding.
DRUG INTERACTIONS:

A 2006 study from the American Journal of Cardiology suggests that pomegranate may interacts with common medications such as heart medication, calcium channel blockers, statins, immunosuppressants and protease inhibitors. For this reason, consult with your doctor before taking supplemental pomegranate.
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Pomegranate

Introduction

Common Name: Anar

Botanical Name: Punica Granatum

Origin: Iran, Afghanistan, India

The pomegranate tree is native from Himalayas in northern India to the Iran and has been cultivated since ancient times throughout the Mediterranean region of Asia, Africa and Europe. An attractive shrub or small tree, to 20 or 30 ft recorded height, the pomegranate is much-branched, more or less spiny, and extremely long-lived. It has a strong tendency to sucker from the base. The leaves are evergreen or deciduous, opposite or in whorls of 5 or 6, short-stemmed, oblong-lanceolate. Showy flowers are home on the branch tips singly or as many as 5 in a cluster. The fruit has a tough, leathery skin or rind, basically yellow more or less overlaid with light or deep pink or rich red. The interior is separated by membranous walls and white spongy tissue (rag) into compartments packed with transparent sacs filled with tart, flavourful, fleshy, juicy, red, pink or whitish pulp (technically the aril). In each sac, there is one white or red, angular, soft or hard seed. The seeds represent about 52% of the weight of the whole fruit. The fruit also was used in many ways as it is today and was featured in Egyptian mythology and art, praised in the Old Testament of the Bible and in the Babylonian Talmud, and it was carried by desert caravans for the sake of its thirst-quenching juice. It traveled to central and southern India from Iran about the first century A.D. and was reported growing in Indonesia in 1416. It has been widely cultivated throughout India and drier parts of Southeast Asia, Malaya, the East Indies and tropical Africa. The most important growing regions are Egypt, China, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Iran, Iraq, India, Burma and Saudi Arabia. There are some commercial orchards in Israel on the coastal plain and in the Jordan Valley.

The name "pomegranate" comes from two Latin words for "seeded" and "apple", which makes a lot of sense, given that a pomegranate looks like and apple and is full of seeds. The pomegranate fruit grows on a small tree or shrub. The tree is native to the area of Persia in the Middle East, but it is now grown further abroad, including in California and Arizona. The most promising of these is the Wonderful which is the only pomegranate now being grown commercially in California.

The interior seeds are surrounded by spongy pulp, and the mess of them together makes the pomegranate particularly difficult to work with.

Steeped in history and romance and almost in a class by itself, the pomegranate, Punica granatum L., belongs to the family Punicaceae which includes only one genus and two species, the other one, little-known, being P. protopunica Balf. peculiar to the island of Socotra.

Despite its ancient background, the pomegranate has acquired only a relatively few commonly recognized vernacular names apart from its many regional epithets in India, most of which are variations on the Sanskrit dadimaor dalim, and the Persian dulim or dulima. By the French it is called grenade; by the Spanish, granada (the fruit), granado (the plant); by the Dutch, granaatappel, and Germans, granatapfel; by the Italians, melogranato, melograno granato, pomo granato, or pomo punico. In Indonesia, it is gangsalan; in Thailand, tab tim; and in Malaya, delima. Brazilians know it as roma, romeira or romazeira. The Quecchi Indian name in Guatemala is granad. The Samoan name is limoni. The generic term, Punica, was the Roman name for Carthage from whence the best pomegranates came to Italy.