Malvika Sharma and Surinder Pal Singh
Baby corn was first discovered by Korean botanist Jason H. Ahn in the early 20th century. Baby corn, the newly developed corn, is used as a vegetable in many Asian cuisines especially in China, Thailand and Taiwan. In Thai cook book it is referred to as candle corn. It has a crisp texture and a subtle, slightly sweet corn flavour which adds a special gourmet touch to many dishes and salads. Its miniature size is appealing, and has delicate sweet flavour, taste, colour, and crunch. It is also gaining fast popularity in Indian market as it can be eaten raw and included in diet in number of ways as salads, chutney, vegetables, pickles, pakora, soup, kheer etc.
During the last one and a half decade baby corn has emerged worldwide as one of the high value crop due to its high nutritive value and exotic taste. Baby corn is highly nutritive and its nutritional quality is superior to some of seasonal vegetables such as cauliflower, cabbage, and tomato and hence can be good dietary supplement. It contains 89.1 per cent moisture, 0.2 g fat, 1.9 g protein, 8.2 mg carbohydrate, 0.06 g ash, 28.0 mg calcium, 86.0 mg phosphorus and 11.0 mg of ascorbic acid. It also contains small amount of vitamin B-complex and vitamin E. Yellow baby corn, in particular, is abundant in carotenoids, zeaxanthin and lutein, which keep eyes healthy that may help prevent coronary artery disease, certain cancers, and cataracts. It is also free from residual effects of pesticides, as the young cobs are wrapped up within the husk and well protected from diseases, insects, fungicides and insecticides. In addition to high nutritional value as human food, another benefit of baby corn lies in utilizing husk, silk, and stover as green herbage for feeding ruminants and swine. It is used as main source of calories in fodder and feed formulation. The corn gives the highest conversion of dry substance to meat, milk and eggs as compared to other cereals.
Baby corn is a money-making crop and farmers can boost their income in a short period by cultivating this crop. Besides being a profitable crop can also become a component of diversification as the crop duration is of only about 60 days as compared to the 110-120 days duration of the grain crop. To achieve the objective, they are required to be equipped with the cultivation technology of this crop. Production of this vegetable is an intensive task. It can be grown either as a primary crop (all ears are harvested for baby corn) or as a secondary crop (the top ear is left to mature for sweet corn or field corn while subsequent ears are harvested as baby corn). The decision whether to grow baby corn either as a primary crop or as a secondary crop will influence variety choice, planting density, and fertilizer rates. New baby corn growers can adopt secondary crop system to avoid market risks.
For commercial production the variety should have certain additional attributes. In baby corn ideal plant should bear at least three cobs with good quality, proper size and shape. Any corn cultivars can be used for baby corn production. Synchronization in cob emergence reduces the cost of harvesting and storage. Therefore, for commercial cultivation of baby corn, the variety should preferably be a single cross hybrid. In addition, the ear quality should be the primary objective when selecting a variety than yield.
Baby corn is hand-harvested one to two days after silk emergence, while the ears are still immature. The ideal ear size is two to four inches long and 1/3 to 2/3 inches in diameter with regular row arrangement that depends on the variety, population density and the cropping season. The most preferred colour by the consumers and exporters is generally creamish to very light yellow. Frequent harvest after every two to three days is necessary because ears can quickly become too large and tough to be sold as baby corn. Young cobs should be picked in the morning. The harvest period can last two to four weeks. By the best production practices, a hybrid variety of baby corn can give 6-8 tones per hectare of husked cobs with 15-20 per cent recovery of de-husked tender cobs. Besides cob yield, 25-35 tones per hectare of green plant yield can also be obtained which can be used as fodder and green manuring and may result in good profit to farmers. Fresh baby corn is highly perishable in hot weather. For every 5°c increase in pulp temperature sugar breakdown to starch doubles, meaning that baby corn can completely lose flavor in a short period of time. Hence growers are suggested that cultivation of baby corn be taken in areas near to main market or having proximity to tourist places.
The success of the crop could also help to boost the economy of the local farmers and even the urban people through kitchen gardening can earn good marginal returns by following such crop which needs less input but more returns. This can also provide an opportunity for crop diversification and besides can provide impetus for development of dairy industry. Last but not least the cultivation and popularity of such crop can generate plenty of employment opportunities.
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