Horticulture Minister and local MLA Kotkhai-Jubbal Narinder Bragta has inaugurated a modern computerised apple packing and grading house and a controlled atmosphere store at Gumma in Kotkhai. The twin facility has been set up with the help of funds provided by the Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority at a cost of Rs 6.8 crore.
The computerised packing house will grade apple on the basis of size and colour and it has a capacity of 4 lakh boxes. The HPMC will charge Rs 140 per box for packaging and grading, which will include packaging material.
The controlled atmosphere store has capacity 35,000 boxes and the charges will be Rs 1.50 per kg per month. The fruit can be stored for almost a year without loss of quality. A refrigerated van has been provided for transportation to the market. Narinder Bragta said that this facility will help apple growers to produce quality fruit for the market and will also help to save time to send their crop in market well in time. Quality packing and grading is a key for the good prices and this facility will give growers both.
