Premium Quality Green Mung Beans

Moong or Green gram is a small ¼-inch, round, olive-green bean that is mustard or off-white coloured inside. The beans have a sweet flavour, soft texture and are easy to digest. Green gram is available in many forms including whole, split, de-husked (yellow) and ground. Split Moong beans or green Moong Dal is Green gram that has been split but not skinned. Since the husk is not removed completely, the green colour is retained. The splitting is done in a mill.

Green Moong dal a traditional ingredient in Indian cooking, often used in curries. Like other legumes, split green gram is low in fat and high in protein and fibre, but it has the added advantage of cooking quickly. Due to its mild, earthy flavour, green Moong dal is best cooked with assertive flavourings.

Grading at the terminal market

Grading of Green Moong bean is mostly applied at the terminal market rather than at the rural market. The major criteria of quality or grade factor are;
  - moisture content, size, quality, appearance and colour of the seeds, damaged and fungal seeds,
In general, there are 5 grade classifications for numgbean as follows

Grade 1 characteristics: good green shining colour, 14% moisture content, the size of seeds are unequal (small and large seeds mixed together)

Grade 2 characteristics: good green shining colour, 14% moisture content, the size of seeds are unequal (small and large seeds mixed together)

Grade 3 Characteristics: fair green shining colour, 14% moisture content, the size of seeds are unequal (small and unequal, mixed with damaged seeds.)

Grade 4 characteristics: poor green shining colour and misshapen, more than 14% moisture content, the size of seeds are unequal, mixed with damaged seeds

Grade 5 characteristics: worst green shining colour and misshapen, more than 14% moisture content, the size of seeds are unequal, mixed with damaged seeds

Grading for Marketing Purposes

Mung beans are classified into grades for marketing purposes:

• Sprouting
• Number 1 processing
• Processing
• Manufacturing

Less than 5% of the total mungbean crop goes into the sprouting market. Processing grade is a broad classification for beans. Prices can vary by as much as $150 per tonne at any time of the year for beans within this broad processing grade classification depending on appearance and quality, i.e. whether good or poor quality processing grade. This is the reason why many choose to market their goods on a sample basis rather than on quality grades

Seasons and cultivation

Green gram is a warm weather crop and comes up in areas receiving an annual rainfall ranging from 50 to 70 cm. It is mainly cultivated in a cereal-pulse cropping system primarily to conserve soil nutrients and utilize the left over soil moisture particularly, after rice cultivation. Hence, although it can be grown in all the seasons, majority of green gram cultivation falls in either Rabi or late Rabi seasons particularly in peninsular India.

Optimum temperature range for growth is 27-30oC. A dry harvest period is desirable as this forces the crop to mature and reduces the risk of weather damage. Green gram is less tolerant to water logging.

India is the world’s largest producer as well as consumer of green gram. It produces about 1.5 to 2.0 million tons of Mung annually from about 3 to 4 million hectares of area, with an average productivity of 500kg per hectare. Green gram output accounts for about 10-12% of total pulse production in the country.