After Delhi, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu, the National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India (NAFED) has decided to extend its ‘Farm Gate to Home Gate’ campaign (the sale of essential commodities at low prices) to more States to help hold the price line of essential commodities.
The scheme will now be taken to Maharashtra, West Bengal and Madhya Pradesh. Gujarat may be the next in line with Chief Minister Narendra Modi due to hold talks with Union Minister of State for Food, Agriculture and Civil Supplies K. V. Thomas and the NAFED officials next week.
“We are trying to co-branch with cooperative and public sector retail chains in States to extend the scheme of selling essential commodities at much lower prices than in the market,” NAFED Managing Director C. V. Ananda Bose said in a statement on Sunday.
Meanwhile, on Saturday, the Railways decided to allot rakes on a priority basis for speedy movement of commodities sold under the ‘Farm Gate to Home Gate’ campaign to States that have become part of the network. Under the campaign, the NAFED procures essential commodities – 20 kitchen basics, including pulses, edible oil, rice and wheat -- from farmers directly and sells them to people; thereby eliminating intermediaries who make the process expensive.
In view of the clamour from States for replicating the scheme piloted in Delhi, the NAFED has placed orders for pulses from Myanmar and edible oil from Malaysia.
