The National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC) and National Productivity Council (NPC) have inked a pact to synergise their activities with an aim to promote productivity and innovation in agriculture and allied sectors.
“We have identified various activities for working jointly to bring about innovation through schemes of central ministries such as Cooperation Ministry, Commerce Ministry and Fisheries and Animal Husbandry Ministry to name a few,” said Mukesh Kumar, Executive Director, NCDC after signing the MoU.
On behalf of the NPC, Vijay Kumar, Secretary of the Council inked the agreement recently here.
In cases where, NCDC is an implementing agency mulling to implement schemes of various ministries like those Ministry of Food Processing and Industry, Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Ministry of Rural Development, Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare, Ministry of Panchayati Raj and others, it may engage NPC to provide services as may be required and vice-versa, as per the pact spanning five years.
The NPC and NCDC will also jointly formulate programmes to make efforts to sponsor or to invite each other or to jointly conduct national/ international institution building activities, research, surveys, capacity development, buyer seller meets, conferences, workshops and studies, as per the MoU.
The NPC is an autonomous body under the Department for Promotion of Industry & Internal Trade, Union Ministry of Commerce and Industry providing services in the area of productivity, research and training services in areas of industrial engineering, agri-business, environment management etc. On the other hand, the NCDC, an autonomous body now under the newly created Union Ministry of Cooperation, is engaged in the promotion of the cooperative movement in the country through various schemes.
Initially assigned to planning, promoting and financing programmes for production, processing, marketing, storage, export and import of agricultural produce, foodstuffs, notified commodities, the NCDC has now expanded to assist different types of cooperatives. It also finance projects in rural industrial cooperative sectors like water conservation, irrigation, agri-insurance, agro-credit, sanitation and animal health.