§1What this business is
Pomegranate does well in semi-arid areas with a hot, dry summer and a cold winter, on well-drained sandy loam to deep loamy soil. Plants raised from cuttings or air layers are set in 60 × 60 × 60 cm pits. The grower chooses one flowering season — mrig bahar (June-July), hasta bahar (September-October) or ambe bahar (January-February) — to suit local water and rain. Fruit is picked fully ripe 120-130 days after fruit set, graded by weight, size and colour, and packed in corrugated boxes. The model counts fruit from the 5th year and grows vegetables between the rows until then.
Capacity: 1 acre, 200 plants. Yield in the model rises from 4.0 tonnes an acre in the 5th year to 7 tonnes an acre from the 8th year.
§2Is it right for you?
Who it is for
A farmer in a semi-arid area with assured irrigation who can wait four years for the first crop.
Who it is not for
Areas with humid weather at fruit ripening, or farmers without a steady water source.
Advantages
- Suits dry areas; drip irrigation saves 44% water and lifts yield by 30-35%
- Flowering season can be chosen to fit local water and market
- Fruit keeps up to 2 months in cold storage at 5°C
- Fresh fruit has export buyers in the Gulf and Europe
Drawbacks
- Fruit starts only in the 5th year in this model
- Fruit cracking spoils the crop when soil moisture swings
- Close planting raises pest and disease pressure
- The loan runs a 60-month moratorium, so interest builds up
Skills you need
- Bahar treatment — forcing flowering in the chosen season
- Training plants on the multi-stem system
- Spray schedule for fruit borer and fruit rot
- Grading fruit into market sizes
Why difficulty 3/5: Long wait for fruit, and flowering control and disease sprays need real skill.
§3Market
Who buys
- Village-level trade agents
- Commission agents at the fruit mandi
- Exporters of fresh fruit
- Juice and canning units
How it sells
- Graded fruit in corrugated fibre board boxes — 3-ply red boxes for the home market, 5-ply white boxes for export
- Truck transport from the orchard to the market
Good to know
- Grades in the trade are super, king, queen and prince sizes, plus 12-A and 12-B.
- Fruit keeps up to 2 months or 10 weeks in cold storage at 5°C.
§4Raw material & machinery
| Item | Qty | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Tube-well | 1 | ₹45,000 |
| Drip irrigation with fertigation system | 1 | ₹20,000 |
| Farm equipment and implements | — | ₹10,000 |
| Store and pump house (150 sq ft at ₹200 a sq ft) | 1 | ₹30,000 |
| Labour shed (50 sq ft at ₹100 a sq ft) | 1 | ₹5,000 |
| Barbed-wire fencing and gates (846 running ft at ₹35) | — | ₹29,600 |
From: National Horticulture Board model bankable project — Pomegranate
- Pomegranate plants (cuttings or air layers)200 plants an acre at ₹20 a plant = ₹4,000
- Farmyard manure and fertilisers₹11,000 at planting; each pit gets 20 kg farmyard manure and 1 kg super phosphate
- Insecticides and fungicides₹4,000 at planting
From: National Horticulture Board model bankable project — Pomegranate
§5Licences & registration
- No licence is needed to grow the crop on your own farm land
- Land ownership or lease papers for the bank loan and subsidy file
- FSSAI registration if you sell packed produce under your own name
- APEDA registration and a phytosanitary certificate if you export
Start it in your state
Pick your state: today’s cost, central + state subsidy, raw material, land and help, on one page.
§6Schemes & subsidies
The model funds the project as farmer's share ₹87,500 (50%), capital subsidy ₹35,000 (20%) and term loan ₹52,500 (30%). Under NHB's current rules, open-field horticulture gets a 35% back-ended subsidy (45% in North-East, Himalayan and scheduled areas) only on projects above 2 hectares that carry a bank term loan, and land cost is not counted. A one-acre plot qualifies only as part of a larger project.
§7Money
How the investment is worked out: One-acre model: land levelling ₹4,000 + fencing ₹29,600 + store and pump house ₹30,000 + labour shed ₹5,000 + tube-well ₹45,000 + drip irrigation with fertigation ₹20,000 + implements ₹10,000 + cultivation ₹31,400 (planting material ₹4,000, manures and fertilisers ₹11,000, pesticides ₹4,000, labour ₹8,800, power ₹3,600) = ₹1,75,000. Land cost is not included.
Working capital: Recurring cost is ₹28,800 in the first bearing year and rises to ₹36,200. Vegetables grown between the rows before fruiting cost ₹10,000 an acre and give about 6 tonnes worth ₹30,000.
Year not printed on the pages of this report; the other reports in the same NHB series are dated November–December 2005 and this one also counts labour at ₹70 a day. Treat every price as about 20 years old.
§8Export potential
Confirm the HS code in the DGFT ITC(HS) lookup before you export
Export council / board: APEDA
- India exported 4,773.70 tonnes of pomegranate worth ₹1,041.85 lakh in 2001-02; the UAE took 3,224.55 tonnes (APEDA figures quoted in the report).
- Other buyers named: Oman, UK, Bahrain, Kuwait, Netherlands and Saudi Arabia. Ganesh and Aarakta are the varieties in demand abroad.
§9Risks — where people fail
- Fruit cracking from boron shortage or uneven moisture
- Fruit borer and fruit-sucking moths
- Leaf spot and fruit rot in the rainy season
- Four years of costs before any fruit income
§1030 / 60 / 90-day plan
A general plan that applies to any business. A plan for this business will be added after research.
- Days 1–30: Visit a working pomegranate orchard unit, ask 10 buyers about price and quantity, and get quotations from 3 suppliers.
- Days 31–60: Udyam and the licences you need (No licence is needed to grow the crop on your own farm land, Land ownership or lease papers for the bank loan and subsidy file), a project report (DPR), and the scheme or loan file.
- Days 61–90: Space and machines, trial production, and first deliveries to 10 customers.
§11Who to connect with
§12Watch
There is no episode on this business yet. Shows are coming soon on the Podcast page.
Want to start Pomegranate Orchard?
DPR, loan file or registration — ask us on WhatsApp.
¶Sources
Data review: 6 October 2026. Spotted a mistake? Report it. For information only — not legal or financial advice.