In spite of torrential rain and wind making most of the red carpets unrolled at the ‘Advantage Jharkhand’ summit venue into muddy yellow and his hoardings grounded, Chief Minister Raghubar Das pumped in air promising better days for investors in Jharkhand.
While inaugurating the summit on food processing on Thursday the Chief Minister projected an image away from what has been attached with the State. “I promise you that this new Government would replace red tape with red carpet. less number of hurdles would welcome investors in the days to come. We have removed MVI checking vehicles at random and are also going to waive tax on farm produce levied by Bazar Samiti,” said Raghubar Das. He also announced to allot land for setting up food processing unit to MK Jalan of ‘Keventer Group’.
The two-day summit is being organised to attract investors in the food processing sectors which has been largely untapped in the State filled with huge potential as fresh fruit and vegetable grower. The CM on the occasion also put this as an opportunity for image reversal for the State.
“Jharkhand is known for its mineral wealth and but for the first time in 14 years an initiative of this kind is being taken. More and more job creation can be done in agriculture sector. We have to convert single cropped land into 2-3 cropped farmlands and the Government has taken certain steps in that direction,” added the CM.
Counting on some measures the CM said that few days ago direction had been given to ‘Jan Sevaks’ to persuade farmers to make ‘farmers group’ who know exactly how and where to check rainwater flowing down as waste in rainy season. This way smaller check dams or bunds with the help of gunny can be made for which Government would directly provide 80 per cent of the fund to the farmer group.
“If the call given by the Prime Minister ‘Make in India’ is to succeed, ‘Make in Jharkhand’ has to be successful as well. For that we need rain water harvesting at mass level. We have to change the scenario where 50 per cent of milk required in the State has to be sourced from outside. We are mulling for ‘cattle hostel’ in villages so that farmers can keep their herds there in case of lacking in shelter for the animals,” said the CM.
Chief Secretary Rajiv Gauba seconding the CM stressed on the importance of correcting the USP of the State in front of investors. “The summit is an opportunity to showcase assets of Jharkhand which is beyond smoke bellowing chimneys, coal mines, Tatas etc. There is much more in the State than iron and steel, mines and minerals,” said the CS.
He indicated that areas such as organic farming, high quality vegetables and forest produce like Amla, tamarind etc were still untapped and added that only 10 per cent of potential available in caged fishery had been utilised so far.
“Besides, there is a danger involved in industry centric development. It can be concentrated around big cities leaving vast section of rural Jharkhand behind. It is important for balanced growth of the State. We now have single window system in place in real terms and on our way to improve on ease of doing business tally.”
Also present was T Nandakumar, Chairman of the National Dairy Development Board. “Best quality of raw material is available here in terms of organic farming. But farmers get low price due to lacking food processing industry. Problems such as supply chain, institutional and infrastructural gap are the major problems,” said he.
Facts suggest that Jharkhand is at second place in pea production and produces 7 per cent of okra, 6 per cent of cauliflower, 10 per cent of cabbage of the country. Most importantly, 12,000 hectares of farmland has been certified with ‘Organic C1’ certification. Agriculture Secretary NM Kulkarni stressed over the need to increase the self-life of produces so that profit can be generated and informed that proposals for investment in the area are under consideration.