Connect with:
Wednesday / March 12. 2025

logo
mobile-logo
Home2024February (Page 8)
AgroPolicy, Cold Storage, Logistics, Supply Chain, Transportation, Warehousing

The Private-Public partnership in post-harvest sector will help in reducing post-harvest losses and improving productivity and boost income of farmers.

Nirmala Sitharaman, Union Finance Minister presented the interim Union Budget for 2024-25 in the parliament.

In the budget presentation speech, Finance Minister said that government will further promote private and public investment in post-harvest activities which includes aggregation, modern storage, supply chains, primary and secondary processing, marketing and branding.

The Private-Public partnership in post-harvest sector will help in reducing post-harvest losses and improving productivity and boost income of farmers.

The Private-Public partnership in post-harvest sector will

AgroPolicy, Animal Husbandry, Live Stock

The scheme will incentivise investments in dairy processing and product diversification, meat processing and product diversification, animal feed plants, breed multiplication farms, animal waste to wealth management (agri-waste management) and veterinary vaccine and drug production facilities

The Union Cabinet approved the continuation of the Animal Husbandry Infrastructure Development Fund (AHIDF) to be implemented under the Infrastructure Development Fund (IDF) with an outlay of Rs.29,610.25 crore for another three years up to 2025-26. The scheme will incentivize investments in Dairy processing and product diversification, Meat processing and product diversification, Animal Feed Plants, Breed multiplication farms, Animal Waste to Wealth Management (Agri-waste management) and Veterinary vaccine and drug production facilities.

The government of India will provide a 3 per cent interest subvention for 8 years including two years of moratorium for loans up to 90 per cent from the scheduled bank and National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC), NABARD and NDDB. The eligible entities are individuals, Private Companies, FPOs, MSMEs, and Section 8 companies. Now the Dairy Cooperatives will also avail benefits for modernization, and strengthening of the dairy plants. 

The government of India will also provide credit guarantees to the MSME and Dairy Cooperatives up to 25 per cent of the credit borrowed from the Credit Guarantee Fund of Rs.750 crore.

 The AHIDF has so far created an impact by adding 141.04 LLPD (Lakh Ltr. Per Day) of milk processing capacity, 79.24 lakh metric tonnes of feed processing capacity and 9.06 Lakh metric tonnes of meat processing capacity by adding to the supply chain since the inception of the scheme. The scheme has been able to increase processing capacity by 2-4 per cent in the dairy, meat and animal feed sector.

The Animal Husbandry sector presents an opportunity for investors to invest in the Livestock sector making this sector a lucrative one ranging from value addition, cold chain and integrated units of Dairy, Meat, and Animal Feed units to technologically assisted Livestock and Poultry farms, Animal Waste to wealth Management and Setting up of Veterinary Drugs/ Vaccine units.

After the inclusion of new activities like technologically assisted breed multiplication farms, strengthening of veterinary drugs and vaccine units, and Animal waste to wealth management, the scheme will exhibit a huge potential for the upgradation of infrastructure in the Livestock sector.

The scheme will be a channel towards employment generation directly and indirectly to 35 lakh people through entrepreneurship development and aims for wealth creation in the livestock sector. So far, the AHIDF has benefitted directly /indirectly approximately 15 lakh farmers.  AHIDF is emerging on a path towards achieving the Prime Minister’s goal of doubling farmers’ income, tapping the livestock sector by bringing the private sector investment, bringing in the latest technologies for processing and value addition, and last but not least contributing to the Nation’s economy by promoting the export of Livestock products. Such investments in processing and value-addition infrastructure by eligible beneficiaries would also promote the export of these processed and value-added commodities.

Thus investment by incentivisation in AHIDF would not only leverage private investment 7 times but would also motivate farmers to invest more on inputs thereby driving higher productivity and leading to an increase in farmers’ income.

The scheme will incentivise investments in dairy

AgroPolicy

Special programmes and schemes announced for dairy, acquaculture and oilseed sectors in Union budget 2024-25.

Nirmala Sitharaman, Union Finance Minister presented the interim Union Budget for 2024-25 in the parliament. Finance minister said that government will raise the fertilizer subsidy by 10 per cent. It will also increase the agri- credit by 10 to 25 per cent. The government will normalise the GST for seeds across the states to boost the income of farmers.

Dairy sector

FM announced that a comprehensive programme for supporting dairy farmers will be formulated. Efforts are already on to control foot and mouth disease. India is the world’s largest milk producer but with low productivity of milch-animals. The programme will be built on the success of existing schemes such Rashtriya Gokul Mission, National Livestock Mission, and Infrastructure Development Funds for dairy processing and animal husbandry.

Oil Seeds

Government will launch programme Aatmanirbhar Oilseeds initiative – Self-sufficiency in the production of oil seeds. Building on the initiative announced in 2022, a strategy will be formulated for achieving self-reliance in oilseeds, such as mustard, groundnut, soya bean, sesame and sunflower. This will cover research in high-yielding varieties, adoption of modern farming techniques, market linkages, procurement, value addition and crop insurance.

 Aquaculture

Government has set up a separate Department for Fisheries realizing the importance of assisting fishermen. This has resulted in doubling of both inland and aquaculture production. Seafood export since 2013-14 has also doubled. Implementation of Pradhan Mantri Matsya Sampada Yojana (PMMSY) will be stepped up to enhance aquaculture productivity from existing 3 to 5 tons per hectare, to double exports to ` 1 lakh crore and to generate 55 lakh employment opportunities in near future.  Five integrated aquaparks will be setup. For promoting climate resilient activities for blue economy 2.0, a scheme for restoration and adaptation measures, and coastal aquaculture and mariculture with integrated and multi-sectoral approach will be launched.

Nano DAP

After the successful adoption of Nano Urea, application of Nano DAP on various crops will be expanded in all agro-climatic zones.

Phased mandatory blending of compressed biogas

(CBG) in compressed natural gas (CNG) for transport and piped natural gas (PNG) for domestic purposes will be mandated.  Financial assistance will be provided for procurement of biomass aggregation machinery to support collection.

Bio-manufacturing and Bio-foundry

For promoting green growth, a new scheme of bio-manufacturing and bio-foundry will be launched. This will provide environment friendly alternatives such as biodegradable polymers, bioplastics, biopharmaceuticals and bio-agri-inputs. This scheme will also help in transforming today’s consumptive manufacturing paradigm to the one based on regenerative principles.

Sitharam mentioned that Crop insurance has been given to 4 crore farmers under the PM Fasal Bima Yojana. This assists the Annadata in producing food for the country and the world.

She also added that 1361 e-mandis have been integrated with 3 lakh crore trading volume. For welfare of our Annadata, every year, under PM Kisan Samman Yojana, direct financial assistance is provided to 11.8 crore farmers.  PM Kisan Sampada scheme has benefitted 38 lakh farmers.

Special programmes and schemes announced for dairy,