PROMOTING UNDERUTILIZED INDIGENOUS FRUIT MARKET IN SRI LANKA AS A NEW AGRIBUSINESS VENTURE: A SYSTEMATIC LITERATURE REVIEW

Abstract

Underutilized crops remain unknown to the people and possess many nutritional, medicinal and botanical values. They contain both macro and micro nutrients, minerals, fiber and water and most of the underutilized crops are grown in local and wild areas. Therefore, these crops can be used to reduce hidden hunger among local communities and popularizing the growing and selling of underutilized fruit and vegetable varieties among Sri Lankan farmers will be a good solution in order to enhance the farm income. Therefore, this systematic literature review aimed to analyze the importance, potentials and limitations   of promoting underutilized fruit and vegetable market in Sri Lanka as a new agribusiness venture. A systematic literature review is essential to promote Sri Lanka’s underutilized fruit and vegetable market with the intention of offering a comprehensive, evidence based foundation. It helps identify market gaps, consumer trends, value addition opportunities and policy barriers.  About twenty three articles published in the Web of Science database were selected for study using the PRISMA method. Many of the researchers found that there are lots of advantages of popularizing and growing underutilized fruits and vegetables among the consumers such as poverty alleviation, solution for hidden hunger, as a source of micro/ macro nutrients and a source of additional farm income. Though, there are some limitations for promoting the underutilized fruit crops, some of them revealed that there are some potentials to promote the underutilized crops. Furthermore, there were value addition and demand for underutilized crops among reviewed research articles.  

Key words: Underutilized crops, Agribusiness venture, PRISMA, Market, Promotion