Union Minister of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution Ram Vilas Paswan announced the procurement of paddy on minimum support price (MSP) in all the mandis and purchase centres in Haryana from Tuesday itself, advancing the procurement season.
The announcement came following a request made by Haryana Chief Minister Manohar lal in this regard.
Paswan along with Manohar lal launched the e-Kharif System, developed jointly by Haryana Haryana State Agricultural Marketing Board (HSAMB) and Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs Department at Karnal on Tuesday.
The Union Minister said that though the MSP is usually implemented from October 1 yet considering the request of the Chief Minister and in the larger interest of farmers, he has taken the decision to start the procurement process from today.
“I have asked the Food Corporation of India (FCI) and other agencies to start the procurement process from today”, said Paswan.
Paswan appreciated the State Government for linking all the ration cards with Aadhar and said that this system has helped the State Government in unearthing about one lakh fake ration cards.
He said that the aim of the Government is to ensure computerization and in the same series point of sale devises would be set up at all ration depots in the state from November 1, 2016.
While giving his assurance to the farmers, traders and consumers, he said that the Central Government will soon going to bring a law to safeguard the interest of consumers and to ensure that they get produce as per the specified standards.
Earlier, while speaking on this occasion, Chief Minister Manohar lal said that Haryana has taken the lead in implementing e-Kharif System through e-NAM in the country.
He said that this system would be beneficial for farmers, arthiyas, consumers and Marketing Board. This system would ensure transparency as it would provide complete details about the quantity of produce sold and money received.
Union Minister of State for Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution CR Chaudhary said that e-kharif system would be beneficial for the traders as they would get SMS alerts on their phone having information about the current rate of produce.
With the implementation of e-kharif system, the farmers would be able to sell their produce in any mandi across the country and similarly, the traders could purchase the produce from any mandi in the country.