The Inter-Ministerial Approval Committee (IMAC) meeting headed by Union Minister for Food Processing Industries, Narendra Singh Tomar, agreed to the proposals of 21 projects, providing investment worth Rs 443 crore along with a grant of Rs 189 crore under the Scheme for Integrated Cold Chain and Value Addition.
These projects will hopefully generate employment for about 12,600 people and will be advantageous for more than 2,00,592 farmers.
Out of these 21 projects approved, 6 were in Andhra Pradesh, 4 in Gujarat, 3 in Uttarakhand, 2 in Himachal Pradesh, and one each in Jammu & Kashmir, Kerala, Nagaland, Punjab, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh.
The Scheme for Integrated Cold Chain and Value Addition Infrastructure targets at halting the post-harvest losses of horticulture & non-horticulture produce and offering lucrative price to peasants.
Apart from this, 8 other projects were given consent in another meeting chaired by the Union Minister with an investment worth Rs 62 crore and supported with grants of Rs 15 crore under the BFL Scheme (Scheme for creation of backward and forward linkages).
These eight projects are expected to create job opportunities for about 2,500 people. The aim of the scheme is to offer efficacious and flawless backward and forward integration for the food processing industry by bridging the gaps present in the supply chain pertaining to availability of raw material and linkages with the market.