KINFRA participates in Food Processing Event
Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) in association with Ministry of Food Processing Industries (MOFPI), Govt.of India organized a Food Processing Seminar – Destination Kerala on 28th June 2018 at Hotel Crowne Plaza, Kochi.
The Indian food industry is poised for huge growth, increasing its contribution to world food trade every year. In India, the food sector has emerged as a high-growth and high-profit sector due to its immense potential for value addition, particularly within the food processing industry.
The Government of India has been instrumental in the growth and development of the food processing industry, which accounts for about 32 per cent of the country’s total food market. Food Processing has an important role in providing support for upliftment of farmers through increased value addition, better prices, improved quality and greater consumer reach. Therefore, Food Processing is expected to play a vital role in achieving the doubling of farmer incomes, an important target set by the Govt. of India.
Kerala has gained a prominent place in the food processing sectorby being able to leverage the tremendous potential for export growth mainly in spices, tea, seafood, cashew, ethnic food preparations etc. With the fertile agricultural resources and tremendous business enterprise, the state has been able to evolve as a major hub for food processing industry.
The highlights of the event was the interactive session with Shri AtulSaxena, Director, MOFPI. He made a detailed presentation on the new Centre Sector Scheme – Pradhan Mantri KISAN SAMPADA Yojana – PMKSY(Scheme for Agro Marine Processing and Development of Agro Processing Clusters) with an allocation of funds amounting to Rs 6000 crores for implementation during the period 2016-20. The SAMPADA is a comprehensive package with the objective to create a modern food processing infrastructure with efficient supply chain management from farm gate to retail outlet.It will not only provide a big boost to the growth of the food processing sector in the country, but also help in providing better prices to farmers and is a big step towards doubling farmers income, creating huge employment opportunities especially in the rural areas, reducing agricultural wastages, increasing the level of processing and enhancing the exports of processed food.He also mentioned about the initiative taken by the Ministry for investors through creation of a new Investors Portal NiveshBandhu.
Shri K A Santhosh Kumar, Managing Director, KINFRA made a detailed presentation on Food Parks in Kerala. He highlighted the pioneering efforts taken by KINFRA in creating a facilitating environment and ecosystem for growth and development of industries in general and food processing sector in particular in the State. Kerala has been the first State in the country to successfully implement the concept of Food Parks in the country.It has to its credit five fully operational Food Parks including one Special Economic Zone exclusively for food processing. In addition two new Mega Food Parks under the Mega Food Park Scheme of MOFPI are under implementation, one by KSIDC at Alappuzha and the second one by KINFRA at Palakkad in the State. He stressed the important features of Mega Food Parks and its proposed linkage with farmers. He also informed that substantial progress has been achieved in implementing these projects and that both the Mega Food Parks are expected to become operational by the year end. He also mentioned about the implementation of the 8th Food Park namely the Spices Park at Idukki is likely to commence in the near future.