New Delhi: Union food processing industries minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal today inaugurated an Rs 150 crore mega food park at Dewas in Madhya Pradesh which will provide employment to 5,000 people and benefit around 5,000 farmers.
The park – Avantee Mega Food Park, was inaugurated by Mrs Harsimrat Badal at a simple ceremony here which was also graced by minister of state for food processing Rameshwar Teli and Dewas mp Mahendra Singh.
Speaking on the occasion, Mrs Badal said the food park would leverage an additional investment of Rs. 250 crore in 25 to 30 food processing units and generate a turnover of about Rs 500 crore annually. She said the modern food processing infrastructure would benefit farmers, growers, processors and consumers of Madhya Pradesh and adjoining areas immensely and prove to be a big boost to the growth of the food processing sector in the State.
Mrs Badal said the food park had been set up in 51 acres of land at a cost of Rs 150 crore. She said the project had fully operational sheds for SMEs, developed industrial plots for lease to food processing units, irradiation plant, dry warehouse, cold storage, common effluent treatment plant, quality control laboratories and sorting and grading facilities for grains. She said the park also has a common administrative building for office and other uses by the entrepreneurs and 4 Primary Processing Centres (PPCs) at Indore, Ujjain, Dhar and Agar having facilities for primary processing and storage near the farms.
The union minister said the food processing sector was being boosted by adding value and reducing food wastage at each stage of the supply chain with particular focus on perishables. She said the Mega Food Park scheme, which was being implemented since 2008, provided for setting up of parks for creation of modern infrastructure facilities for food processing along the value chain from farm to consumer. She said common facilities and enabling infrastructure was created at Central Processing Centre and facilities for primary processing and storage was created near the farm in the form of PPCs and Collection Centers (CCs). EOM
