Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Friday stressed upon linking farmers directly to the market and removing intermediaries with an objective to improve the income of farmers.
Inaugurating an Odisha Agri Conclave 2021 on virtual platform, he said the emphasis of his Government is to enhance the farmers’ income by responding to the dynamics of the market.
“We need to streamline their connectivity to the aggregators and processors to play the role as producers. We need to remove intermediaries who don’t add value to the supply chain,” he said. Stating that the Agri Conclave has been organised to link the State’s farmers to the organised national market, Patnaik invited the top agri-business leaders to be partners in the growth of agribusiness in Odisha.
He said the State Government’s farmer-focused approach backed by various schemes have started yielding results. There is considerable evidence of local surplus of agriculture and horticulture produce.
Patnaik said it is now evident that the agri sector is a silver lining in the current Covid-19 pandemic situation. The State has attained self-sufficiency in food production. Minister for Agriculture & Farmers’ Empowerment Arun Sahoo said Odisha is a pioneer in promoting agriculture enterprises through ease of doing business. WODC Chairman and Principal Advisor to CM Asit Tripathy gave the keynote address.
Odisha Agri Conclave 2021 is a joint endeavour of State Agriculture & farmers’ Empowerment Dept and National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India to make the process of farming easier for farmers. The initiative has helped in providing State’s traditional, indigenous and nutritious products support to get prominence into global market.