ANOTHER "MEGA" DREAM FOR FOOD PROCESSING- A GRANDIOSE "PLAN"

Ever since the Ministry of Food Processing Industry(MoFPI)was established as a Special Purpose Vehicle of Government of India two decades ago, like any other government agency, this set up has been producing reams of papers, often glossy, promising many things and raising visions of a vibrant food industry in the country. It is well known that on a per unit investment food processing sector create more employment provided it is dominated by small and medium scale enterprises. If large scale mechanization is deployed in the processing, the employment content comes down drastically. A look at the past developments, the Indian food industry is increasingly being controlled by Mega companies and MNCs with huge investment and capital intensive foreign originated technologies sidelining the small and tiny sector players. Frequent "declarations" that MoFPI would increase the value addition to agricultural produce, raise the GDP contribution and substantially increase exports is turning out to be mere sloganeering and whatever the country has been able to achieve so far is in spite of the government by the enterprising private players. The latest "Plan" to set up 10 Mega food parks can materialize only if adequate industry friendly environment is provided and just offering subsidies will end up in huge tracts of land being appropriated by big fishes under the garb of establishing food processing units. Here is the grand stand posturing of MoFPI on this grandiose plans.

"The food parks will be built in Andhra Pradesh, Punjab, Jharkhand, Assam, West Bengal, Uttarakhand, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Bihar and Tripura. Ministry has introduced Mega Food Parks Scheme (MFPS) to accelerate the growth of food processing industry in the country through facilitating establishment of strong food processing infrastructure backed by an efficient supply chain. Ministry informed that the scheme provides for a capital grant of 50 percent of the project cost in difficult and Institute for Transportation and Development Policy(ITDP) notified areas(with a ceiling of Rs 50 crores). The government is likely to be spent a sum of Rs.488 crore by March 2012 on the scheme for technology upgradation and modernization of food processing industries. A Mega Food Park takes about 30-36 months to be completed. The working group on food processing for the XII Plan has recommended a new centrally sponsored scheme in the form of National Mission on Food Processing (NMFP) proposed with seven components".

It is true that China has achieved lot using the strategy of Mega Food Parks which helped that country as a major exporter of processed foods of all hues at relatively low cost. But this has happened because of extraordinary facilities and support provided by the government there in stead of just "passing on" the money as it is happening in India. A Mega Food Park must be "mega" in size by bringing in many diverse processors from the small and medium scale sector in stead of a few mega companies with very little employment content. In stead of Mega Parks what the country needs is hundreds of functional industrial estates with superb infrastructure and a few common facilities including marketing help. Big companies have sufficient resources to set up their own facilities and do not need any prop from the government. One can only hope better sense will prevail eventually!

V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com

MEGA DREAMS GOING SOUR?-WHO IS TO BE BLAMED?

It is rare that a government admits that any of its program is not doing well in spite of massive budgetary provisions made under grandiose plans with little realism. The so called "Mega Food Park" plans envisaged setting up specialized industrial estates with high quality infrastructure for entrepreneurs to move in with minimum hassle so that considerable time is saved in chasing the various agencies to get the required permission and support. Alas, the program seems to have fallen flat in the absence of any determination and perseverance at the ground level by those vested with the task. Here is a take on this issue.

"Your ministry has admitted to non-functionality of most of the mega food parks barring two or three. Will investment still go into this project? Projects like mega food parks are infrastructural projects which take time. There were land related issues which delayed execution. However, we are receiving a lot of interest from the industry. The government has now approved 30 mega food parks. The plan is to have one mega food park in each state and if the proposal is good enough we can even have two parks subject to the availability of space".

Many countries like Singapore, China and others have used this concept very effectively to boost production of value added food products, especially for exports, India seems to have found a way to "fritter" away this opportunity by the heavy bureaucratic muddle associated with government schemes. Imagine how effective and convenient it would be for a spirited entrepreneur to be housed in such a Food Park with common facilities for power, water, waste disposal, quality assessment, storage, marketing and global communication. Unless there is a priority and deep commitment such mega schemes cannot be expected to succeed no matter how much hype is generated!


V.H.POTTY
http://vhpotty.blogspot.com/
http://foodtechupdates.blogspot.com