FPO model to help double farmers' income well before target: Minister

The farmer-producer organisation (FPO) model could help achieve the goal of doubling cultivators' income "well before time", a Union minister said Thursday.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had earlier talked about doubling the income of farmers by 2022, Minister of State for Agriculture Parshottam Rupala noted.

Some successful FPO models are working in the country and efforts could be made to replicate them or expand their ambit to other regions, he said.

"Using this FPO model, farmers are in a position to fix the price of their production and together we need to take this solution forward," he said.

Rupala was speaking at the national workshop on 'Making Farmer Producers' Organisations: Smart, Competitive and Sustainable' at the Vaikunth Mehta National Institute of Cooperative Management here.

"Due to the central government's policies in the last three years, agriculture production is breaking all records and now as PM Modi said, we need to connect agriculture production to the other aspect - that is doubling the income of farmers in the country," he said.

"Through this FPO model, we can achieve the goal of doubling farmers' income well before time and I am sure that after seeing your participation and enthusiasm today, this is very much possible," Rupala said.

He advised farmers and FPOs to see what is the global trend in terms of consumer needs and cater to that demand.

"Earlier, there were veg and non-veg categories but currently organic items are in demand in the veg category, so FPOs should tap such a market and cater to the demand by providing branded and reliable organic products," he said.

Citing examples of Chinese products like fire crackers and kites, he said those companies know about festivals in India and accordingly, cater to demands of consumers here.

Sukhpal Singh, professor at the Centre for Management in Agriculture at IIM-Ahmedabad, talked about the present challenges and emerging needs of FPOs, and said cooperative farming is more beneficial than private farming.

Farmers should have the right to decide the price of their produce, he said.

Ramesh Chand, member of the NITI Aayog and the 15th Finance Commission, said 2,700 FPO/FPC (farmer-producer companies) are registered with the Small Farmers' Agri-business Consortium (SFAC) at New Delhi and NABARD, which is considered to be very less in a country where farming is the main occupation.

He called for developing more such organisations in the country.

The event was attended by 300 delegates, including FPO representatives from various states, policy-makers, banks, financial institutions, international funding agencies, agri marketing agencies and technology providers.