Building India's Clean Plant Program

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The project aims at improving horticulture crop farmers' access to certified disease-free planting materials across India. This will result in improved yields, crop quality, and climate resilience of horticulture crops in India in the long-term. The preliminary target crops of the project are almond, apple, avocado, berries, citrus, grapes, guava, litchi, mango, pomegranate, and walnut. The project will improve institutional and regulatory frameworks to operationalize the clean plant program for horticulture; develop clean plant centers that maintain disease-free foundation materials that will be later propagated by accredited nurseries; and increase propagation of disease-free planting materials under the certification scheme by accrediting private nurseries, and testing and certifying their planting materials. The project directly enhances the climate resilience of the horticulture sector as the use of certified disease-free planting materials makes farmers more resilient to climate impacts and reduce crop losses.