Saghar Hussain, a farmer in Sadiqabad township’s Manthar area, is now cultivating dragon fruit at his farms. Hussain was motivated by an agriculture expert who visited the area in 2019. According to Hussain, Pakistan Agriculture Research Council Karachi Director General Dr Attaullah Kunri provided him 50 seed branches of the fruit and he established a nursery for cultivation. Initially, he cultivated the fruit over 0.1 ha in February 2020 and harvested 55 pieces in September 2022.
He said now he had produced 30,000 plants of the fruit in his nursery and would cultivate it on a little over 4 ha. He said he used tunnel farming which cost him Rs300,000 (€1.400). He said 1,800 plants would be sowed over an acre and each plant would produce 50 to 100 fruits of half kg each.
According to Khwaja Fareed University of Engineering and Information Technology’s Life Sciences’ Head of Department, Prof Dr Ammara Riaz, the fruit’s cultivation has greatly gained popularity worldwide due to attractive colors, sweetness, juicy and pleasant taste. It is also associated with high antioxidant capacity of bioactive compounds such as polyphenols, flavonoids and betacyanins that have important functions for human health.
Source: dawn.com
