The 15th Finance Commission headed by N.K. Singh on Wednesday commended policy measures taken by the Food Processing Ministry to raise farm income and generate value-added activities.
Singh met Union Minister for Food Processing Harsimrat Kaur Badal and senior officials to get an overview of the sunrise sector. The Commission felt that it was of immediate value to complete the 'Cold Chain Grid' project of the ministry and value-added infrastructure, which is now underway. This grid could facilitate seedless cold chain infrastructure from farm-to-fork and would require a grant of about Rs 10 crore per project, a statement from the Commission said.
During the discussion, the Commission stressed that various initiatives in the sector are critically dependent on simultaneous reforms in the agriculture sector, long-term contract farming, abolition of APMC and reducing the obtrusive reach of other connected regulations.
The Commission was also appreciative of the ministry's project 'Operation Greens' which is an integrated value chain development of tomato, onion and potato (TOP) crops and price stabilisation measures.
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