Bhubaneswar: At least 24 Private Sector Institutional buyers, such as, ITC, Big Basket, Mother Dairy, DeHaat, Indian Ocean Group participated in the Round Table organized by Department of Agriculture & Farmers’ Empowerment.
And 12 MoUs were signed between Institutional buyers and Government of Odisha.
Representatives from Nine FPOs engaged in procurement and marketing of crops, such as, Chili, Ginger, Turmeric, Cashew, Mango, Jackfruit, Millets, Lemongrass participated in focused group discussion with private sector buyers in presence of Minister Agriculture & Farmers’ Empowerment, Arun Sahoo.
Sanjeev Chopra, Agriculture Production Commissioner (APC) and ACS Agriculture and Farmers’ Empowerment, Sanjeev Chadha, Secretary Co-operation, Special Secretary, Agriculture and Farmers’ Empowerment graced the occasion.
Mr.Chadha was proactively organizing Round Table and has been able to impress the Institutional Buyers about the huge scope Odisha is offering.
With Mr.Chadha’s vast experience in turning around NAFED, Odisha Government is utilizing his services to scale up Agri Marketing Institutions in the State.
Director of Horticulture, Director Agriculture and Food Production, Director, Soil Conservation and Watershed Development along with officials from ORMAS, OSAM Board, APICOL MD were present in the Round Table.
Exhorting the private sector to come forward with market requirements, the Minister for Agriculture and Farmers’ Empowerment, Department of Fisheries and Animal Resource Development Arun Sahoo said the State Government will concurrently develop cluster-based market model to streamline the production systems as per market demand, build capacity of the FPOs to ensure quality supply and bring sustainability in the supply chain.
The Minister said this while addressing the Round Table on Agri-marketing organized here today by Department of Agriculture & Farmers’ Empowerment.
The holistic development of agriculture and allied sectors can be achieved through investment in infrastructure, value addition, quality enhancement and remunerative market linkages, he said while stressing that enhancing income of farmers has been the utmost priority of the Naveen Patnaik Government.
“The department is actively working to strengthen the agriculture marketing ecosystem in the state through promotion of Farmer Producer Organizations, strengthening of Production Clusters and schematic convergence for value addition,” he said.
The round table was organised to establish sustainable institutional market linkages between the Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs) and leading Agri-business corporates to fetch remunerative prices for agriculture and horticulture produces.
The round table is a follow up event of Odisha Agri Conclave 2021 to involve private players in developing strategy to promote crop specific sourcing from the state through the Farmer Producer Organization (FPO) channel, Minister Mr.Sahoo said.
Odisha Government has been one of the pioneers in forming the Odisha FPO Policy, 2018 which has been promoting and strengthening FPOs in the State. The Department of Agriculture and Farmers’ Empowerment will also implement its State Plan Scheme for Promotion and Stabilization of FPOs in the State, he said.
Currently, more than 600 FPOs are being promoted and supported under government policies and schemes like PKVY, RKVY, MIDH, Odisha Millet Mission, APC, Central Sector Scheme Formation and Promotion of 10,000 FPOs. Many FPOs have also been set up independently, said he.
The Government of Odisha seeks engagement of private sectors with farmer producer organizations (FPOs) in the State in setting up of sustainable sourcing models.
Odisha sports a rich harvest of marketable surplus agriculture and horticulture commodities such as Maize, Millets, Aromatic rice, Cotton, Turmeric, Chili, Ginger, Lemon, Watermelon, Lemongrass and Kewda, Mango, Cashew and Coffee, Sweet Potato, Brinjal, Tomato, Okra and
Onion.
The State also followed success of Green Revolution and focused on production led agriculture system to attain self-sufficiency in food grain production.
