Raipur, Jun 3: Union Minister for Food Processing Industries, Narendra Singh Tomar virtually inaugurated the Indus Best Mega Food Park on Thursday along with Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel, and in presence of Union Minister of State for Food Processing Industries Rameswar Teli.
Tomar said the Mega Food Park will ensure value addition, longer shelf life for farm produce, better price realization for farmers, excellent storage facility and will provide an alternate market for farmers in the region. "The Park will also provide direct and indirect employment to about 5,000 persons and benefit about 25,000 farmers in the Core Processing Centres (CPC) and Primary Processing Centers (PPC) catchment areas", said Union Minister Tomar. Tomar also said that the modern infrastructure for food processing created at Park will benefit the processors and consumers of Chhattisgarh and adjoining areas immensely and prove to be a big boost to the growth of the food processing sector in the State of Chhattisgarh.
Tomar said that the present government is fully committed to providing an environment that is smooth, transparent and easy for investors wanting to start an enterprise in India and in a bid to make India a resilient food economy and the Food Factory of the World, the government has made Food Processing a major thrust area of 'Atma Nirbhar Bharat'. "Narendra Singh Tomar thanked the Chief Minister of Chhattisgarh and the State Government authorities for their efforts in setting up the Indus best Mega Food Park", informed an official press release by the union ministry. Besides, Rameswar Teli said that the state-of-the-art infrastructure and processing facilities developed at Indus Best Mega Food Park, will not only reduce wastage of agricultural produce but will also ensure value addition. This will also provide an opportunity to farmers, Self Help Groups (SHGs) and micro-entrepreneurs to undertake processing operations on plug and operate basis and create huge job opportunities in the catchment area of the Park.
It will also contribute to doubling farmers' income and will also help in bringing more investments in Chhattisgarh. In a tweet by Chhatisgarh CMO, it informed, "Union Agriculture Minister, Narendra Singh Tomar, in a program organized under the chairmanship of Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel today virtually launched Indus Best Mega Food Park at village Bemta-Sarora in Tilda development block of Raipur district of Chhattisgarh." "Cold storage of 6,650 metric tonnes capacity and 22 thousand metric tonnes dry warehouse facilities are also available in the food park", the tweeted informed further.