Farmers of North-East, Himalayan regions receive assistance from Agriculture Ministry

AHMEDABAD: Under National Horticulture Mission and Horticulture Mission for North-East and Himalayan States (HMNEH), the Agriculture Ministry is offering aid to farmers for remunerative returns and also to ensure adequate supply of fruits and vegetables to consumers.

The farmers are receiving assistance from the Ministry for cultivation, establishment of cold storages, setting up of terminal markets, wholesale markets and rural primary markets/apni mandies. The National Horticulture Board is considering to implement various schemes.

Moreover, during 2011-12 under the aegis of the Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana (RKVY) the ministry has also introduced a new programme on Vegetable Initiative for Urban Cluster (VIUC). The ministry has implement the scheme in one city each of 28 States with a population of one million or capital city.

According to Mr Harish Rawat, the Minister of state for Agriculture and Food Processing Industries, the fruits and vegetables prices are generally governed by the market forces of demand and supplyand also depends on prevailing weather conditions, cost of transportation, storage and rising demand.

Mr Rawat said, “Fruits and vegetables being perishable commodity, the ministry does not have any proposal to fix its minimum support price. However, the it is implementing Market Intervention Scheme (MIS) on request of State/ UT Governments for procurement of various horticultural commodities. Losses, if any, incurred by the procuring agencies are shared equally between the Central Government and the State Government concerned on 50:50 basis (75:25 in case of North-Eastern States).”