Union Home Minister and Minister of Cooperation Amit Shah will inaugurate a day-long mega conclave “Strengthening PACS through FPOs” in Pragati Maidan, New Delhi on July 14, 2023. The conclave is aimed at discussing ways to strengthen Primary Agricultural Credit Societies (PACS) through Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs), reads a government release.
The mega conclave is being organized by the National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC) in collaboration with the Union Ministry of Cooperation. The conclave will witness participation of experts from the sector as well as members from the FPOs across the country.
It bears recalling that at the initiative of the Cooperation Ministry, the Ministry of Agriculture entrusted NCDC to form and promote 1100 FPOs in the Cooperative Sector through strengthening of PACS under the scheme to bolster the cooperative sector and provide comprehensive support to small and marginal farmers.
Under the FPOs Scheme, financial assistance of Rs.33 lakh is provided to each FPO and a financial assistance of Rs 25 lakh per FPO is given to the Cluster Based Business Organizations (CBBOs) for promoting and handholding the FPOs.
FPOs are seen as one of the major vehicles for agricultural transformation which are capable of realizing Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi’s vision of “Sahakar se Samriddhi”. FPOs are also being touted as playing a crucial role in making farming sustainable and in promoting livelihoods and improving overall quality of life of those dependent on agriculture.
The Government has been pushing for integration of the PACS in the FPO scheme to enable the farmers to expand their business range of activities such as supply of production inputs; agricultural equipment like cultivator, tiller, harvester, etc. and processing and value addition, including cleaning, assaying, sorting, grading, packing, storage, transportation, etc.
The PACS have a huge member base of around 13 crore farmers who are primarily engaged in short-term credit and distribution of seeds, fertilizers, etc. Presently, more than 86% of farmers in the country are small and marginal.
Since, there is a need to facilitate these farmers with access to improved technology, credit, better input and more markets to incentivize them to produce better quality commodities, the Government has already taken steps to encourage the farmers associated with the PACS to form FPOs. In this regard, the Central Sector Scheme “Formation and Promotion of 10,000 Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs) was launched under the aegis of the Union Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare.
The NCDC is a statutory organisation under the Ministry of Cooperation with the mandate to plan, promote, and finance cooperatives for increasing production and productivity and instituting post-harvest facilities. During the FY 2022-23, the NCDC disbursed Rs. 41,031.39 crore in different sectors including agriculture processing, weaker sections, computerization of cooperatives, service, credit and youth cooperatives and others.
Recently we did a story on NCDC performance in these columns titled NCDC doling out the highest ever loan; earns profit keeping 0% NPA (https://www.indiancooperative.com/featured/ncdc-doles-out-highest-ever-loan-earns-profit-keeping-0-npa/)