By TIOL News Service

NEW DELHI, FEB 27, 2020: MEETINGS of the Inter-Ministerial Approval Committee (IMAC) were held under the Chairpersonship of Union Minister of Food Processing Industries, Ms Harsimrat Kaur Badal, at New Delhi. Total of 32 projects were sanctioned in these meetings under the 'Unit' scheme of PMKSY of Ministry of Food Processing Industries. The projects are spread across almost 17 States, leveraging an investment worth 406 Crore rupees.

These projects envisage the creation of direct and indirect employment for approximately fifteen thousand persons along with employment opportunities in rural areas to be the focus area. The introduction of modern processing techniques for food results in improved shelf-life of the agricultural produce and ensure steady revenue to farmers. Food processing has an important role to play in linking Indian farmers to consumers in the domestic and international markets. The Food processing industry can work as link between Farmers, Government and unemployed youth for better contribution towards economy. The Government of India through the Ministry of Food Processing Industries (MoFPI) is making all efforts to encourage investments in the business. It has approved proposals for joint ventures (JV), foreign collaborations, industrial licenses, and 100 per cent export oriented units.

The main objective of this Scheme is creation of processing and preservation capacities and modernisation/ expansion of existing food processing units with a view to increasing the level of processing, value addition leading to reduction of wastage. The processing activities undertaken by the individual units covers a wide range of post-harvest processes resulting in value addition and/or enhancing shelf life with specialized facilities required for preservation of perishables.   

The food sector has emerged as a high-growth and high-profit sector due to its immense potential for value addition, particularly within the food processing industry as it is said to have Compound Annual Growth Rate(CAGR) of approximately 8 percent over the last five years. The projects approved are running across quadrilaterals of the country covering over 100 agro-climatic zones. The Processed food market is expected to grow to USD 543 bn by 2020 from USD 322 bn in 2016, at a CAGR of 14.6%.

MoFPI is implementing PMKSY and the period of implementation is 2016-20 with a total outlay of Rs 6,000 crore. The PMKSY has seven component schemes viz; Mega Food Parks, Integrated Cold Chain and Value Addition Infrastructure, Infrastructure for Agro-Processing Clusters, Creation of Backward and Forward Linkages, Creation/Expansion of Food Processing and Preservation Capacities, Food Safety and Quality Assurance Infrastructure, and Human Resources and Institutions.

Meetings of the Inter-Ministerial Approval Committee (IMAC) to sanction above projects were held on 21.02.2020 and 26.02.2020.