Punjab government today said the restructuring of the Food Corporation of India (FCI) should ensure smooth procurement of crops and it should also benefit farmers and consumers.
"...It (restructuring of FCI) should be in such a manner that it should benefit both farmers and consumers besides ensuring flawless procurement and public distribution system (PDS)," Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal placed his views before former union minister and senior BJP leader Shanta Kumar who is heading the committee for restructuring of FCI here today.
The committee is mandated to give suggestions to reorient FCI's role and functions in MSP operations, storage and distribution of food grain and food security systems.
Taking part in the deliberations, the Chief Minister urged Shanta Kumar that the restructuring of country's premier food procurement agency should be done to eliminate difficulties and bottlenecks in way of smooth and timely procurement of food grains.
He recalled the significant contribution of Punjab in national food security adding that agriculture was the lifeline of the state and also of nation.
The Chief Minister suggested the committee that a mutually agreed Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) must be signed between the FCI and the state government well in advance of procurement season clearly stipulating obligations and rights of both the stakeholders in detail.
Likewise, he also opined that the cost sheets should also reflect realistic and actual costs besides deputing separate staff for procurement and movement of grains.
Badal said that the storage charges should be rational and FCI should procure its allotted share.
He further said that the system of Minimum Support Price (MSP) must not be done away with abruptly until it introduces a self-sustaining mechanism of income support to the farmers.
He urged the committee to strongly recommend state's case for allocating sufficient funds for agriculture diversification as the previous UPA government just sanctioned a peanut of Rs 500 crore, against Rs 5,000 crore sought by the state, for Punjab and Haryana of which the state was allotted merely Rs 225 crore.
Shanta Kumar assured the Chief Minister that the committee would look into all the aspects and issues raised by the latter before taking a final decision.
He said that the committee would give due weight age to the suggestion put forth by the various stakeholders to further strengthen and integrate the supply chain of food grains besides bringing far more transparency, efficiency in the procurement and PDS by the FCI.
