‘World Food India’ conference is being organised by the ‘Ministry of Food Processing’ in partnership with the ‘Confederation of Indian Industry – CII’.
Over 200 companies worldwide, 18 government delegations, many domestic CEOs and state representatives are attending it.
What did the PM say?
PM Modi inaugurated the conference and spoke at length about the opportunities available for the food industry in India.
Having the world’s second-largest arable land area and 127 diverse agro-climatic zones, India has a natural advantage in the sector.
While Private sector participation has been increasing in many segments of the food value chain more is required in contract farming and raw material sourcing.
There is a clear opportunity for global supermarket chains to consider India as a major outsourcing hub.
States have been urged to come up with attractive food policies to win investments and develop specialisations in select products.
What were the ideas for increasing nutritional value?
Aerated drink majors were asked to consider blending 5% of fruit juice in their products to increase nutritional value.
Food majors were asked to explore the opportunities offered by the railways were over 1 million meals are served daily.
Apart from post-harvest management, the immense potential in niche areas such as organic and fortified foods was pointed out.
Promoting traditional foods such as coarse grains due to their “nutrition-rich and climate-smart” nature was suggested.
The capability of India’s long food tradition to blend taste with nutritional value was elaborated.
Along with modern technology, processing and packaging, this can help the world overcome lifestyle diseases.
What are the Schemes on the avail?
Farmers are central to food processing industry and ‘Pradhan Mantri Kisan Sampada Yojana’ has helped streamline this.
The scheme envisions an investment of $5 billion for promoting food processing, cold storages and other infrastructure.
It is expected to benefit 2 million farmers and generate more than half-a-million jobs over the next 3 years.
Under the scheme 9 ‘Mega Food Processing Parks’ are already operational and and more than thirty others are coming up.
How does different sectors look?
Dairy sector is vital area the rural economy, increasing and diversifying the product profile in the sector is being worked on.
India currently ranks sixth in production and export of honey is heading towards a sweet revolution.
Indian fisheries products are exported to about 95 countries and a a big leap through the envisioned ‘blue revolution’ is awaited.
Current focus is on development of untapped areas, such as ornamental fisheries (pearls) and trout farming.
Functional infrastructure for organic food production also exists in the vast stretches of the northeast states – a path to sustainability.
