Mission Organic Value Chain Development for North Eastern Region

Why is in news? Review progress of Phase-III of Mission Organic Value Chain Development for North Eastern Region

A two-day Stakeholder Workshop Meeting was concluded, the meeting was organized to review the progress of Phase-III of the Mission Organic Value Chain Development for North Eastern Region (MOVCDNER).

On 13th July 2023 progress made under the scheme was reviewed with focus on how to liquidate the committed liability of Phase III and roadmap for implementation of Phase IV of the scheme staring 2023-24.

States were requested to suggest the activities and plans which could be taken up associated with availability of funds under MOVCDNER Scheme.

MOVCDNER scheme launched during 2015-16 has helped in bringing 1.73 lakh ha area under organic farming benefiting 1.89 lakh farmer.

Brief presentation was made by North Eastern Development Finance Corporation Ltd. (NEDFi) on marketing and entrepreneurial support followed by presentation from Officials of various schemes of DA&FW and MoRD to explore convergence opportunities in NER.

Highlighted during discussion:

Per Drop More Crop - Promote micro irrigations among farers through the FPOs and leverage MGNREGRA for MI projects by developing crop specific estimates.

National Rural Livelihood Mission (NRLM) - 2 FPCs to be developed through convergence with NRLM at state level by defining roles and responsibilities of SRLM as IA and CLF as CBBOs

Agriculture Infrastructure Fund - Workshop to be conducted in Guwahati where FPO wise challenges will be identified and banks shall be engaged to facilitate credit

MGNREGA - Support for fencing and land development to be explored through MGNREGA.

Sub-Mission for Agriculture Mechanization - Study to be undertaken by Biswanath School of Agriculture to identify suitable machines for NER. States to provide information on machine requirement of FPOs and awareness will be generated among them by circulating videos and modules.

Integrated Scheme of Agriculture Marketing - Conducting training programs for FPOs and onboarding them on the e-Nam portal and helping FPOs to access a combination of AMI and AIF Schemes.

Agriculture Technology Management Agency - Engaging ATMA functionaries and experts to ensure training and awareness programs for farmers.

Mission Organic Value Chain Development for North Eastern Region (MOVCD-NER):

It is a central sector scheme under the Government of India's organic scheme which aims at development of organic value chains in the North East Region of India.

The scheme is being implemented in all eight states of the North East India namely Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim and Tripura since 2015-16.

The scheme entails creation of 100 FPO/FPC across the eight states comprising a total area of 50000 hectare. As of 2018, 50,000 farmers have been engaged under the scheme.

The scheme provides support to the complete value chain through inputs, seeds, organic certification, creation of facilities for collection, aggregation, processing, marketing and brand building initiative.

Organic certification of the land under the FPOs is done by a third-party certification body under the National Programme for Organic Production (NPOP), which is mandatory for exports.

India’s North-East region has witnessed a very limited use of agro-chemicals with farmers using traditional methods and on-farm inputs for farming.

The region is also characterized by a diverse agro-ecological zones, variable terrain and sufficient rainfall to support a wide variety of fruit, grain and spice crops.

The organic credentials of the region received a boost in the year 2016 when Sikkim was declared India’s first organic state by Prime Minister. MOVCD-NER scheme was conceptualized to explore this untapped potential for organic in the region.

Scheme components:

The scheme has been divided into various value chain components which includes Production, Processing and Marketing for which support is provided to the farmer/FPO in terms of organic inputs, organic certification, processing and storage infrastructure.

Under its Value Chain Processing component, the scheme offers subsidies to FPOs and private investors to set up processing and post-harvest infrastructure such as integrated processing units, collection centres, grading and sorting centres, cold storage units, and refrigerated transport.

Subsidies of up to 50% can be availed by private companies while the FPOs can avail a 75% subsidy.

The FPOs of the MOVCD-NER scheme grow a variety of spices, fruits and grain crops like turmeric, Ginger, large cardamom, chilli, pineapple, kiwi, mandarin, red rice, Black Aromatic Rice (Chakhao), Kachai Lemon, glutinous rice, etc.