Centre Approves Rs 206.8 crore for Implementation of Agriculture Export Policy Scheme

The Indian government has approved a sum of Rs 206.8 crore for a Central Sector Scheme named ‘Implementation of Agriculture Export Policy’ that aims to double farmers’ income by the year 2022.

The government through a notification informed that “It has approved a Central Sector Scheme ‘Implementation of Agriculture Export Policy’”. Of the total amount, Rs 134.50 crore has been allotted to setup dedicated clusters for bananas, mangoes, pomegranate, grapes, turmeric, tea, coffee and marine products, along with pre & post-harvest management of the production, upgrading the supply chain to achieve much higher levels of export from those clusters.

The approved scheme also requires outlay for post-harvest infrastructure in the clusters, capacity building, funding towards Public Private Partnership for Integrated Agriculture Development (PPP-IAD) & laboratories.

The ‘Agriculture Export Policy, 2018’ aims to double farm exports to $60 billion by the year 2022 from $30 billion in 2018 and for this it will invest Rs 1,400 crore to establish specialized clusters in different states for various produce to push exports.

It must be noted that the central government had approved the agriculture policy in December 2018, lifting all restrictions on organic as well as processed food under which the norms for sensitive farm goods like onions will be evaluated from time to time.

A government official said, “A Monitoring Cell will be set up by the Department of Commerce and a Project monitoring division will also be engaged”.

Few other things included in the scheme are help to state agencies, institutional mechanism, marketing, product development & research and development.