Cold storage (Flickr.com/Walmart) Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in her third tranche of Rs 20 lakh crore Atmanirbhar Bharat announcement, said that today’s (15 May) announcements will pertain to agriculture and allied services.
To improve agricultural infrastructure a Rs 1 lakh crore would be provided to fund infra projects at the farm gate and aggregate points.
This measure is aimed to plug the shortage of adequate cold chain and post management infrastructure for farm produce. This Rs 1 lakh crore financial facility will provide an impetus to develop farm-gate and aggregation points and a viable post-harvest management infra.
The government has also sanctioned Rs 10,000 crore to develop 2 lakh Micro Food Enterprises with an emphasis on improving health and safety standards, retail market integration and improving income.
This scheme will also promote a cluster based approach to support region specific production like Mangoes in UP, Kesar in Jammu and Kashmir and Makhana in Bihar.
The scheme also hopes to tap into unexplored export market via India’s organic produce. The Finance Minister gave the example of the popularity of organic drinks like Turmeric Latte - which has grown in popularity in various countries.
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