farm , and provide facilities for transportation , logistics and centralized processing centres ( CPC ) as well as farm-proximate Primary Processing Centres ( PPCs ). A grant of up to Rs 50 crore per project was to be provided by the Ministry of Food Processing Industries and it was envisaged that each Mega Food Park would be completed in 30 months – which , rightly so , proved to be an excessively idealistic target .
Like all large infrastructure development projects , things were slow to take off due to a variety of reasons such as time taken in land acquisition and CLU , financial closure , environmental approvals , unfavourable SPV structuring norms in the Scheme Guidelines , and in some cases unviable locations .
As a result , by 2015-16 , the Scheme was written off by many ; but the time of Mega Food Parks was still to come . The Ministry too introduced two major initiatives to infuse fresh energy in the
MFP Scheme –
· Setting up a food processing fund under NABARD for providing loans at concessional rates to Food Parks and units within the Food Parks .
· Re-launch of the CEFPPC Scheme with a grant-in-aid of up to Rs . 5 crore , with preference
Total Mega Food Parks : 41
Operational Mega Food Parks : 24
Mega Food Parks under various stages of implementation : 17
Cumulative Project Cost : Rs . 4635.87 crore
Promoters ’ contribution : Rs . 2664.74 crore
MoFPI Grant : Sanctioned Rs . 1971.13 crore
Released : Rs . 1465.26 crore
STATUS ( AS OF APRIL 2023 ) for food processing units established inside food parks .
Transforming Indian Agriculture
The Mega Food Parks have started playing a significant role in giving a boost to the agribusiness sector and will continue to play an even more important role in the next 5-7 years . The examples are now evident and include :
• Patanjali ’ s journey to become an FMCG powerhouse started with its Patanjali Mega Food Park in Haridwar . Its food products revenue is going to touch USD 1 Billion soon and it sources produce , directly and indirectly , from more than 10 lakh farmers . It has commercialized some
AgriTech
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