The north-eastern state of Tripura shares an 856-km border with Bangladesh. Most of this is fenced off except in a few patches in Sepahijala and Dhalai districts. Tripura exported its first consignment of queen pineapple to neighbouring Bangladesh’s Comilla district through Srimantapur Land Custom Station (LCS) last week.

As the Tripura government puts an emphasis on local produce, the queen pineapple — one of the three varieties of the tropical fruit grown in the state — has got maximum attention. President Ramnath Kovind declared queen pineapple the state fruit of Tripura during his visit in June.

Last year, 30 tons of the fruit was exported to Dubai and Doha. This year Bangladesh has been added to the list along with local hubs in Assam, West Bengal and Delhi. “We have exported 20 tons of pineapples to Delhi two days back. Overall 130 tons of pineapples have been exported this year,” Tripura Horticulture Assistant Director Dipak Baidya told. He hopes to access the Chittagong Port -only 60 km from South Tripura- across the border to send more consignments to UAE. Baidya said the state Horticulture Department, NERAMAC and other stakeholders have started to pool their resources to promote aggressive pineapple sales across the country and abroad.

Meanwhile, the authorities have installed a solar-based cold room at Nagicherra forest development corporation complex near Agartala. Two more similar cold rooms have been ordered from the National Institute of Solar Energy, Haryana to support commercial cooling requirements in case of long-distance transportation. Reefer vans are also being purchased for cooling during transportation.