Narsapuram MP K. Raghu Ramakrishna Raju has urged Union Minister for Railways Piyush Goyal to introduce a cargo express between Bhimavaram and Guwahati on the lines of the first such train being operated between Hyderabad and New Delhi.
‘Aqua hub’
In a letter, Mr. Raju told Mr. Goyal that the Bhimavaram region was the “aqua hub of India,” which accounted for a staggering ₹10,000 crore out of the State’s total annual turnover of ₹30,000 crore from the aquaculture and fisheries sectors.
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He said Andhra Pradesh was the leader in the production and export of fish and shrimp in the country.
The MP said hundreds of trucks transport aqua products daily from the Bhimavaram region to Bhubaneswar, Kolkata, Guwahati and other markets in the north-eastern States.
Fish and shrimp were highly perishable items and there were many instances of road accidents as the drivers race against time to take the consignments to their destinations.
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A cargo express between Bhimavaram and Guwahati would help in faster delivery of the aqua products and benefit the farmers a lot by virtue of it being an economical means of transport, the MP said.