Mango Festival in Hyderabad

Hyderabad, May 27 (ANI): Almost 300 varieties of mouth watering mangoes have been put on display at the three-day Mango Festival in Hyderabad, which commenced on Tuesday.

The curtain-raiser to this festival dedicated to the 'King of Fruits' witnessed hundreds of visitors.

The exhibition hosted by the Horticulture Department of Andhra Pradesh is also an attempt to bring buyers and sellers on a single platform.

According to S Chellappa, Principal Secretary, Agriculture Technology Mission of Andhra Pradesh, the purpose of organising such festival is to boost production of mangoes.

"299 varieties are displayed here. To bring more areas under one extension... and to increase the production and as a result to provide more employment and the final result is to reduce the dependency on rice," said Chellappa.

Baneshan, Totapuuri, Neelam, China Rasam, Pedda Rasam, Daseri, Himayat Pasand, Alphonsa, Kesar and Sora are some of the varieties on display at this grand festival.

Apart from fresh mangoes, several mango-based products such as juice, pulp, pickles are also on display.

About 1,000 varieties of mangoes are grown in India and the acreage under mango cultivation is in an area of 2.5 million hectares.

The states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Orissa, Assam, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu are the major mango-growing states in India. (ANI)