Entrepreneurial Opportunities in Tuber Crops Processing

In an era of liberalization of world trade where there is a continuous inflow and outflow of goods into and from a country, the need for developing competitiveness to sustain in global markets is extremely important. The term ‘entrepreneurship’ has been defined by Cole as ‘“Entrepreneurship is the purposeful activities of an individual or a group of associated individuals undertaken to initiate, maintain or organize a profit oriented business unit for the production or distribution of economic goods and services”. Tuber crops, though branded as poor man’s crops have remarkable unrealized potential for processing into novel and high value products for food, feed and industrial uses. Cassava, sweet potato, yams, aroids, minor tuber crops like coleus, tannia, yam bean, arrowroot etc. are the important sources of starch after cereals and are used as staple or supplementary food. The perishable nature of tropical tuber crops, the difficulties in long distance transport, storage, marketing constitutes major problems for their post harvest utilization.