Nagpur Bureau: City based research institute, ICAR- Central Citrus Research Institute (ICAR-CCRI) will be celebrating the 37th foundation day on 28th July, as informed by Dr Dilip Ghosh, Director of the institute in a Press conference held on 27 th July at the institute. Started in 1985 as a Citrus Research Station at Nagpur under the aegis of Indian Institute of Horticultural Research (IIHR), Bengaluru, it was later renamed as NRC for Citrus and the foundation stone of the center was laid on 28 July,1985. Further, in 2014 it was upgraded and rechristened as Central Citrus Research Institute (ICAR-CCRI). It has 250 acres of land out of which 180 acres are under citrus plantation on which research experiments are being conducted. Citrus is the third major fruit crop of the country with more than 14 million tons of production from 1-million-hectare area and livelihood of millions of people is depended on it. Over the years, ICAR-CCRI has established and delivered as the nodal agency in R&D paradigms of Indian citrus industry.
ICAR-CCRI has contributed immensely to serve the Indian citrus industry and made research efforts to solve the challenges like unavailability of certified disease free planting material, insect-pest and diseases, nutrient deficiencies, scarcity of irrigation water, climate change, lack of post harvest fruit handling and processing across India. Since last 3 decades, CCRI has made significant contributions towards developing farmer – friendly technologies for the benefits of the citrus growers. National Citrus Repository at ICAR-CCRI, Nagpur has 489 exotic and indigenous accessions. Institute has identified some promising cultivars like, NRCC Nagpur mandarin seedless-4 and NRCC acid lime-7, NRCC acid lime-8, NRCC Pummelo-5, NRCC Grapefruit-6, Cutter Valencia, Flame Grapefruit and Pummelo US-145, and a promising rootstock i.e. Alemow, for commercial cultivation in the country.
“Shoot Tip grafting” and other tissue culture techniques for production of disease-free plants of Nagpur mandarin is another success area of the institute. The institute has produced and distributed more than 40 lakhs disease-free planting material countrywide. Technology Mission on Citrus (TMC) was operational at CCRI under MIDH, GoI since 4th January, 2007 at Vidarbha, since 19th June, 2009 at Marathwada and since 16th May, 2011 at Chhindwara till 2019. Under TMC, CCRI distributed disease-free planting material of citrus to the citrus growers.
The institute has organized 19 National Kisan Mela’s with participation of 13,962 citrus growers and 85 trainings of 3-4 day duration covering 4463 citrus growers & officials including North-East and also 7 virtual training programme conducted in the COVID-19 pandemic. Trained a total of 52,869 personnel including farmers, officers and Subject Matter Specialists across India and abroad.
Regional Research Centre for Citrus (RRCC) was established and started functioning from March, 2017 at Biswanath Chariali, Assam which will cater the research and development needs of citrus industry of entire northeast India. Total 51 citrus accessions have been planted in field gene bank and 29 citrus varieties are being evaluated at Assam and few of the citrus cultivars started showing promising results.
The Institute received ICAR’s Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel Best Institute Award during 2005, Ganesh Shankar Vidyarthi Hindi Krishi Patrika Puraskar for Hindi magazine “Santra Samvad” during 2010-11 and various awards for scientists for their excellence.
On the occasion of foundation day, ICAR–CCRI is honored to commemorate the 75 years of India’s Independence and celebrating as “Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav”. The main function of the weeklong celebration activities, will be organized on Wednesday, 28th July, 2021 at 3.30 PM in the training hall of the institute. The chief guest for the programme will be Dr. C. D. Mayee, (Ex. Chairman, ASRB ICAR, New Delhi) along with Dr. Y. G. Prasad (Director, ICAR- Central Institute for Cotton Research, Nagpur) and Dr. B. S. Dwivedi (Director, ICAR- National Bureau of Soil Survey & Land use Planning, Nagpur) as the Guest of Honour. The programme will be presided over by Dr. Dilip Ghosh, Director, ICAR- Central Citrus Research Institute, Nagpur.
