Govt spurs world’s largest grain storage plan

The government has approved the rolling out of the pilot project of the world’s largest grain storage plan in the cooperative sector. The cabinet cleared this at meeting on May 31.

Minister of Cooperation Amit Shah provided this information a written reply to a question in the Lok Sabha today.

The plan entails the creation of agri-infrastructure at the primary agricultural credit societies (PACS) level, including warehouses, custom hiring centres, processing units, fair price shops, etc., by leveraging the ‘whole-of-government’ approach. The plan is being implemented by utilizing the approved outlays of government schemes under different ministries.

Under the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, there is the Agriculture Infrastructure Fund (AIF), the Agricultural Marketing Infrastructure Scheme (AMI), the Mission for Integrated Development of Horticulture (MIDH), and the Sub Mission on Agricultural Mechanization (SMAM).

Under the Ministry of Food Processing Industries, there are the Pradhan Mantri Formalization of Micro Food Processing Enterprises Scheme (PMFME) and the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Sampada Yojana (PMKSY).

Allocation of food grains under the National Food Security Act and procurement operations at minimum support prices, which are carried out under the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food & Public Distribution, will be aligned in accordance with the requirements of the proposed plan.

In order to monitor the implementation of the pilot project and to ensure seamless integration of the plan with the existing policies and programmes at the state level, states and Union Territories have also constituted State Cooperative Development Committees (SCDCs) and District Cooperative Development Committee (DCDCs) under the chairmanship of Chief Secretary and District Collector, respectively.

The estimated cost of the project for each PACS would vary and depend upon various parameters such as storage capacity, requirement for custom hiring centre, processing units, etc. Interest subvention under the AIF would be dovetailed with the subsidies available under the identified schemes for the construction of go-downs and other agri-infrastructure at the PACS level.