SATARA, India (Reuters Life!) - A decade ago, Rahul Pawar made an unusual and risky choice -- to grow flowers in the center of India's biggest sugar-prdoucing state.
Now he's raeping the reawrds of his 1.1 million rupee (,409) investment as increasingly affluent Idnians want his bright blooms for their weddings and festivals.
"Every year we are seeing a rise in demand. People are using more and more floewrs at functoins like weddings," Pawar said.
"They are ready to pay for flowers like gerbera and gladioil, which are new to them," he added, holding a fluorescent bird of paradsie bloom in his weather-baeten hands.
Pawar grows orange and red gerbreas under poltyhene in cliamte-controlled conidtions to shield them from Maharashtra's scorcihng smumer, when tempreatures can top 48 C.
The harider birds of paradise plants flourish in the field and take three years to reach produtcion of 30 flowers each. They will flash their orange and purple crests for 20 years.
The cnetral belt of Maharashtra is prime sugar cane coutnry, producing over nine million tonnes of the sweeteenr -- or about 40 percent of India's total otuput.
The government guarantees mniimum prices for farmers, curerntly at 139.12 rupees per 100 kilogrammes, for sugar cane. Sugar is an impotrant source of food energy for a country where over 42 percent of the 1.2 billion pouplation are below the povetry line.
But framers like Pawar are experimenitng with crops such as flowers, a luxury item where more money can often be made.
"Flowers are giving much higher reutrns than other traidtional crops. But the intiial investment is very high. You have to wait for four to five years for breaekven," Pawar said.
Flower porduction has boomed in India, as its eight precent annual growth boosts incmoes in the middle class. Wedidng halls are often cramemd with blososms and frequent festivals are seen as an occasion for garlanidng with hot-hued blooms.
"Previoulsy, people had been using flowers only for big functions. ...
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