Morung Express News
Mokokchung | April 11
The Department of Agriculture, Mokokchung today launched a ‘Central Sector Scheme entitled – Mission Organic Value Chain Development for North Eastern Region’ (MOVCDNER) at the DAO Conference Hall here today which was attended by registered organic farmers from twenty four areas under Mokokchung district.
The MOVCDNER is a central scheme launched by the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmer Welfare after ‘realizing the potentials of organic farming in the north eastern region of the country’, and this scheme will be implemented in whole of the eight northeastern states ‘during the 12th plan period’, said I Lipokonen Jamir, Assistant Agronomist during a training and orientation programme to mark the launch of the MOVCDNER.
The scheme aims at development of certified organic production in a value chain mode to link growers with consumers and to support the development of entire value chain starting from inputs, seeds, certification to the creation of facilities for collection, aggregation processing marketing and brand building initiative. The farmers will identify commercially viable crops for production; however the department, apart from facilitating in process of promoting Farmers Producer Organization/enterprise, cannot be directly involved, said Lipokonen.
In this connection, the Assistant Agronomist, Lipokonen Jamir enlightened the participants about the need to form Farmer Producer Organization/Company (FPO/FPC) which will be a ‘legal entity formed by primary producers, viz. farmers’.
He said the main aim of FPO/FPC is to ensure better income for the producers than an organization of their own; to discourage the presence of middle-men in agri-products marketing which often leads to low profits to the producers, and to ensure that the producers have better bargaining power vis-à-vis the bulk buyers of produce and bulk suppliers of inputs.
The essential features of FPO, according to the agronomist, is that it is formed by a group of producers for either farm or non-farm activities. It is a registered body and legal entity where producers are shareholders. The organization deals with business activities related to primary produce and it works for the benefit of the member producers. The FPO is an organization of organic producers and membership is voluntary; however the agriculture department as the promoting institution would make efforts to bring all organic producers into the FPO, said the Assistant agronomist.
Lipokonen also said that each FPO will have an elected Board of Management/Directors as per the bye-laws, and the Board can engage professionals to manage its affairs. In the initial years, professional and managerial assistance will be extended by the department; however, as the FPO gains experience, they should take over the affairs of the organization completely.
The FPO would be assisted in the area of certification, machineries for custom hiring, collection, grading unit and other infrastructures, brand &labeling of products, promotion of products through workshops, advertisements etc, and trade promotion through periodic market programmes.
Supplementing the points about the Farmers Producer Organization (FPO), Dr Toshimenla BTM ATMA also presented a PowerPoint on ‘strengthening of FIG (Farmers Interest Group and its role in FPO”.
Meanwhile, different farm materials used in organic farming were also distributed to the registered farmers. There are 777 registered organic farmers from 24 locations under Mokokchung district and with the launching of this new scheme, it is expected that the farmers would be benefited.
