CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
1.1. Introduction
Orchid belongs to the largest family (Orchidaceae) of the flowering plants (Royer, 2003). Orchidaceae are cosmopolitan, occurring in almost every habitat apart from deserts and glaciers. The great majority are to be found in the tropics, mostly in Asia, South America and Central America (Chakrabarti, 1986). Some countries of the world have indigenous orchid; Bangladesh is one of them. Indigenous orchids of Bangladesh are Rhyncostylis sp., Pierardi sp., Arides sp., Dendrobium sp., Cymbidium sp., Arnada sp., Arathera sp., Bokthara sp., Eridis sp., Miltonia sp., Hoya sp., Vanda sp. These orchids are found naturally occurring on the mango tree, wood apple tree, tamarind tree, rain tree, sissoo etc (Kabir, 2007). Exotic orchids of Bangladesh are Dendrobium sp., Oncidium sp., Phalaenopsis sp., Cattleya sp., Vanda sp., Ascocenda sp., Brassavola sp., Mokara sp., Paphiopedilum sp. (Kabir, 2007).
In 1909, in Bangladesh the land-lord of Baldha in Dhaka, Norendra Narayan Roy established the Baldha garden. He collected various orchids with other plats to rich his garden, which were collected from various countries of the world. In 1975, Forest Department published a booklet named “Baldha garden” which enlisted the name of about 26 orchid sp. (Kabir, 2007). The environment of Bangladesh is favorable for orchid plantation. If it is cultivated commercially in a large scale, it would be a great source of employment and would be able to earn a lot of foreign currency by exporting orchid flowers as exporting Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, Japan and some other countries (Kabir, 2007). In Bangladesh, three NGO's are planting orchids in a large scale. These are BRAC, Wonderland Toys and Proshika (Anonymous, 2007).
As Orchids has a huge potential to earn currency as well as creating employment opportunity, country like Bangladesh should give emphasis on the management and cultivation techniques of Orchids to hold this sector. On the other hand, the lack of information regarding Orchid management, cultivation techniques and contribution of Orchid is a barrier of raising this sector. However, no study yet has been explored on this issue. Taking this view ahead the present study was conducted on the two NGOs (i.e. BRAC and Wonderland Toys) of Bangladesh to explore the economic condition, management and cultivation techniques of Orchids.
1.2. Study Objectives
The objective of the study is given below:
· To know the cultivation and management techniques of orchids.
· To determine the income of NGOs through orchid plantation.
