New Delhi, Jul 13 (KNN) The Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA) signed Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India Ltd (NAFED) on Monday.

This MoU will strengthen exports potential of agricultural and processed food products of cooperatives as well Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs).

According to the MoU, the key areas of cooperation include facilitating APEDA registered exporters getting assistance under all the Govt. of India schemes implemented through NAFED. 

The MoU also envisages ensuring sustainability and growth of exports by Cooperatives by addressing issues such as technology, skill, quality products and market access.

The collaborations will support engaging Cooperatives involved in agricultural production for improving the quality of agri-produce and its consolidation for better price realization to the farmers.

APEDA would facilitate exports by the Cooperatives, FPO’s, partners and associates identified and promoted by NAFED. Both the organisation will also facilitate participation of Farmers’ Cooperatives in global trade including B2B & B2C fairs to be organized in India and abroad and also to mutually cooperate in international business development & promotions.

The MoU entails providing assistance towards capacity building of Cooperative Societies, Self-Help Groups (SHGs) for their social & environmental compliances and skilling as per international standards. 

Both the organisations would organize awareness programs Skill Development Programmes and Workshops at Regional, State and National levels.

They have agreed to work in close coordination towards sustainable Cluster development of the clusters in various States notified under Agri Export policy.

The MoU was signed by Dr. M. Angamuthu, Chairman APEDA and Sanjeev Kumar Chadha, Managing Director, NAFED. It was signed for utilising both the organisations’ expertise by mutually working together to synergize the activities in the interest of agriculture and allied sectors for bringing better value to the stakeholders.

APEDA has been focusing on collaborative approach to bring synergy with number of organisations and institutions having inherent professional and specialised expertise in different areas. 
Agri Export Policy (AEP) announced in 2018 was framed with a focus on agriculture export oriented production, export promotion, better price realization to farmer and synchronization within policies and programmes of Government of India. It focuses on “Farmers’ Centric Approach” for improved income through value addition at source itself to help minimize losses across the value chain.

The exports policy therefore suggests to adopt the approach of developing product specific clusters in different agro climatic zones of the country to help in dealing with various supply side issues viz., soil nutrients management, higher productivity, adoption of market oriented variety of crop, use of Good Agriculture Practices (GAP) etc.

APEDA has been engaged with State Governments for the implementation of AEP. The States  have finalized the State specific Action Plan for exports while the action plans of other States are at different stages of finalization.

At present, NAFED is creating a network of honey FPOs across Jammu & Kashmir, Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh. Around 65 FPOs will be part of honey corridor linking north-west to north-eastern regions.

NAFED is aiming at bringing all the FPOs associated with honey production for creating requisite infrastructure under the National Beekeeping and Honey Mission, NAFED’s  subsidiary Federation of Indian FPOs and Aggregators (FIFA) is currently partnering with FPOs and private sector.