A visit to Dinesh Baggad’s guava orchard in Madhya Pradesh would leave you speechless at the sight of hundreds of gigantic guavas hanging from the trees that spread out throughout the apparently endless orchard. A few years ago, Dinesh’s farm was not the sight to see that it is now. The farmer, from Sajod-Rajod village, used to raise chillies, tomatoes, okra, bitter gourd, and other seasonal vegetables on his 4-acre ancestral land. However, a major infestation of pests and fungi, as well as rising labour expenses, had lowered his profit margins and revenue.

“Market rates don’t raise much in comparison to production costs, and modest earnings over the years make farming economically difficult,” Dinesh, who earned about Rs.7 lakh through conventional farming, explains.

In 2010, a friend advised he should pursue gardening and introduced him to a Thai guava variety. “The guava appeared to be enormous in the photographs and video. I also went to a neighboring state’s orchard and was amazed since each fruit weighed at least 300 grams and almost grew to the size of a muskmelon,” he adds.”The variety is named as VNR-1, and I discovered that the fruit had a six-day shelf life and was less vulnerable to infection.

Dinesh now has 4,000 plants in his orchard, which generates him Rs.32 lakhs per year. Around 400 farmers in Madhya Pradesh have followed his footsteps, inspired by his achievement. “At first, I had concerns that the fruit variety had been injected with hormones or other chemicals to attain their gigantic size,” Dinesh says. However, after planting a handful on my property, I obtained my first fruiting after 11 months using traditional agricultural practises. The heaviest fruit weighed 1.2 kg.”