Union Minister for Agriculture and Farmers Welfare Radha Mohan Singh has invited Ministers of 13 states to discuss priority programs of the Government. The high voltage meeting is scheduled to take place Wednesday at Krishi Bhawan in Delhi.
Singh intends to review the two priority programs of the Government namely National Agricultural Market (e-NAM) and Soil Health Card. State Ministers of Agri-marketing of 13 States and State Agriculture Ministers of some selected States will be attending along with their senior State officials.The markets of these states are integrated into e-NAM.
The Agri-market reforms being driven by the Ministry and NITI Aayog and incorporated in the new model Agriculture Produce and Livestock Marketing Act, 2017 will also be discussed to encourage the States to adopt the suggested provisions at the earliest to bring in the benefits for the farmers.
According to govt sources, 455 markets from 13 States have been integrated into the national web based portal of e-NAM with the registration of over 47 lakh farmers and 91,000 traders.
Official sources claim this innovative market process is revolutionizing the agri markets by ensuring better price discovery, bringing in transparency and competition to enable farmers to get improved remuneration for their produce moving towards “One Nation One Market”.
The second cycle of Soil Health Card scheme which began from 1st May 2017 is building on the lessons learnt from the first cycle so as to improve its efficiency and make it more user-friendly for the farmers. So far 9 crore soil health cards have been distributed to farmers in all the States of the country, govt sources claimed.
The review meeting will enable Central and State Governments to jointly address issues to take these programs forward thereby contributing to enhancing farmers’ income – the prime objective of all the programs of the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, said a govt release.