The production of flowers is estimated to be nearly 300,000 metric tonnes of loose flowers and over 500 million cut flowers with stem. In the case of production also, the estimates could be at variance from the actual figures as some of the flowers like rose, chrysanthemum, and tuberose are used both as loose flowers and with stem.
It may be mentioned that almost all of the area reported here is under open field cultivation of flowers. Protected cultivation of flowers has been taken up only in recent years for production of cut flowers for exports. The estimated area in production is about 200 hectares, which is likely to increase to over 500 hectares by the year 2000.
Recognising the potential for low cost production for export, in view of cheap land, labour and other resources, several export oriented units are being set up in the country. These projects, located in clusters around Pune (Maharashtra) in the West, Bangalore (Karnataka) and Hyderabad (Andhra Pradesh) in the South, and Delhi in the North, are coming up in technical collaboration with expertise mainly from Holland and Israel. More than 90 percent of these units are for rose production, on an average size of 3-hectare farm, while some projects for orchid, anthurium, gladiolus and carnation are also being set up. Nearly one third of over 200 proposed projects, have already commenced production and export.