Facts:
- India loses an estimated Rs.92,000 crore a year due to wasted food
- Rs.9,000 crore has been invested in new cold storage capacity in the past two years and this has reduced 10% of the country’s food wastage
- The government is planning to set up 100 new cold chain projects at a cost of Rs. 12,000 crore to Rs.13,000 crore
Mega Food Park :
The Scheme of Mega Food Park aims at providing a mechanism to link agricultural production to the market by bringing together farmers, processors and retailers so as to ensure maximizing value addition, minimizing wastages, increasing farmers’ income and creating employment opportunities particularly in rural sector.
Aim of the Scheme: The Scheme is aimed at providing modern infrastructure facilities along the value chain from farm gate to the market with strong backward and forward linkages.
What these food parks provide?
- They facilitate the efforts to increase the level of processing of agricultural and horticultural produce, with particular focus on perishables, in the country and thereby to check the wastage.
How it operates?
- The Scheme has a cluster based approach based on a hub and spokes model. It includes creation of infrastructure for primary processing and storage near the farm in the form of Primary Processing Centres (PPCs) and Collection Centres (CCs) and common facilities and enabling infrastructure at Central Processing Centre (CPC).
- The PPCs are meant for functioning as a link between the producers and processors for supply of raw material to the Central Processing Centres.
- CPC has need based core processing facilities and basic enabling infrastructure to be used by the food processing units setup at the CPC. The minimum area required for a CPC is 50 acres.
- The scheme is demand-driven and would facilitate food processing units to meet environmental, safety and social standards
Implementation and financial assistance:
- Mega Food Park project is implemented by a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) which is a Body Corporate registered under the Companies Act. State Government/State Government entities/Cooperatives applying for setting up a project under the scheme are not required to form a separate SPV.
- The financial assistance for Mega Food Park is provided in the form of grant-in-aid at 50% of eligible project cost in general areas and at 75% of eligible project cost in NE Region and difficult areas (Hilly States and ITDP areas) subject to maximum of Rs. 50 crore per project.
Benefits:
- Reduction in post-harvest losses.
- Maintenance of the supply chain in sustainable manner.
- Additional income generation for the farmers.
- Shifting the farmers to more market driven and profitable farming activities.
- It will be a one stop shop where everything will be available at a single location.
- As per experts, it will directly employ 10,000 people.
- Integrated food parks will help reduce supply chain costs.
- Wastage across the food value chain in India will also be reduced and quality and hygiene improvement to create food products in the country can also be seen.
Critically comment on the objectives of government’s Mega Food Park scheme and the progress made so far in establishing them. (200 Words)
With the aim to give boost to the food processing industry in the country Mega Food Park Scheme was launched in 2008.MFPS is based on cluster approach where a number of FPI would be available at a single point. It is based on hub and spokes model and includes Farm collection centre, primary processing centre and central processing centre. They provide facilities like grading, sorting, pulping, cold storage, warehousing, value addition etc. Thus it increases the shelf life of the farm produce and at the same time reduce wastage.
However, since the launch of the scheme only 4 parks are operational and the scheme is facing certain constraints like:
- Most parks would need 30 to 50 acres of land – difficult to acquire without the active support of state governments, which are often found wanting
- Securing bank finance and getting other necessary approvals are also problematic in the absence of facilities for single-window clearance
- It is not easy to get the right kind of tenants or co-partners, basically processors and ancillary players, for these projects
- Typically, a mega food park should have 30 to 35 units, including service providers, which are often difficult to put together.
- The availability of farm produce suitable for processing in mechanised units is another limiting factor, given that most of the traditionally grown fruits and vegetables are normally meant for direct consumption. This would require introduction of new seeds in the raw material catchment areas and adoption of contract farming which is often unsuccessful without government endorsement.
- Basic necessities, such as uninterrupted supply of power, gas and clean water, are not guaranteed for many of the proposed food parks.
- The idea of shared infrastructure, which may prima facie appear sound, does not always appeal to the prospective entrepreneurs as the needs of different units vary, requiring specialized facilities. The service providers, too, are usually unwilling to set up the required facilities unless they are assured of sufficient year-round business.
Agro processing is having huge potential to raise non-farm income of farmer. As more than half of population is dependent on Agriculture Govt. should pursue this scheme more vociferously to bring technology, investment into this sector. It will act as Sun rise industry for economy as a whole providing raw material and food security and earning For Ex etc.