The Ministry of Finance has said that 1,646 food processing projects (including food testing labs and R&D projects) have been sanctioned under various sub-schemes of PM Kisan Sampada Yojana. Those projects are sanctioned till December 18, 2024, and are valued at Rs 31,830.23 crore, with a potential to leverage private investment of Rs 22,722.55 crore.
Ministry of Food Processing Industries (MOFPI) has implemented Pradhan Mantri Kisan Sampada Yojana (PMKSY), since 2016-17. It is expected to create a processing and preservation capacity of 428.04 LMT/annum, besides employment generation of 13.42 lakh, and extending benefits to 51.24 lakh farmers is also targeted through these projects.
To ensure faster growth of the agriculture and food processing sector, the government said it is committed to further promoting private and public investment in post-harvest activities including aggregation, modern storage, efficient supply chains, primary and secondary processing, and marketing and branding. The government is pushing to increase the level of processing and enhance the export of processed foods through the creation of modern infrastructure with efficient supply chain management from farm gates to retail outlets under food processing projects.
PM Formalisation of Micro Food Processing Enterprises (PMFME) Yojana, a centrally sponsored scheme being implemented by MoFPI since 2020-21, provides financial, technical, and business support for the upgradation of micro food processing enterprises. It is the first-ever scheme for the unorganized sector.
Under PMFME Yojana, more than 3.10 lakh SHGs with seed capital support and 1,14,388 individuals with credit linkages subsidies have been sanctioned till December 18, 2024.
The Ministry of Finance also gave updates about financial support for setting up 50 multi-product food irradiation units in the MSME sector that were announced in the budget for 2024-25. Expression of Interest (EOI) was issued in August 2024 to invite proposals for setting up multi-product food irradiation units under the Integrated Cold Chain and Value Addition Infrastructure Scheme of PMKSY. 20 project proposals have been received against the EOI and are under scrutiny or evaluation as per the scheme guidelines.
Further, in the update for the PLI scheme for the food processing industry, the finance ministry said 133 companies are currently covered under the program. Investments worth Rs 8,910 crore have been attracted so far.