CM Jagan Inaugurates 6 Food Processing Units, Lays Foundation for Five Units in AP

VIJAYAWADA: Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy on Tuesday launched the 11 food processing units established with a budget of ₹1,719 crore, under which an inauguration ceremony was held for six units and the foundation laid for five units.

These units have a combined production capacity of 3.14 lakh tonnes of food items annually. Around 40,307 farmers would benefit from these initiatives.

The Chief Minister inaugurated in virtual mode the six food processing units and laid the foundation stone for five units from the Camp Office here on Tuesday. He announced the launch of four primary vegetable and fruit processing centres in the Annamayya and Chittoor districts, a millet processing unit at L Kota in the Vizianagaram district and an onion and tomato dehydration cluster at Thadakanepalle in the Kurnool district.

Foundation stones were laid for three primary tomato processing centres in Satya Sai and Anantapur districts, a groundnut processing unit at Dharmavaram in Satya Sai district and a Mondelez India Foods unit in Sri City, Chittoor district.

Jagan Mohan Reddy said the government was helping farmers in getting MSP through RBKs for their produce. “We are launching 421 primary processing collection centres connected to 1,912 RBKs and 43 cold storage rooms linked to 194 RBKs. There would be a total of 945 collection centres and the works of 344 cold storage rooms are in progress. While cold storage rooms, drying platforms, collection centres as also grading and segregation units should be linked to RBKs as part of primary processing, the secondary processing units should be established at the district level,” he said.

“Whenever farmers do not get MSP for their produce, we are helping them through RBKs by intervention. The primary and secondary processing centres would play a key role in this. These centres would play a proactive role in future, in facilitating better prices.”

The Chief Minister said he was happy to lay the foundation for the ₹1,600 crore unit of Mondelez India Foods in Sri City in Chittoor district.

“I wish all success to this company that manufactures chocolates, Cadbury and Bournvita.  Its readiness to invest ₹1,500 crore in the second phase speaks of the confidence the industry has in the government. In the last four years, we spent ₹8,000 crore through intervention for providing MSP whenever there was a price fall. AP is the only state to have provided MSP even for millets and linking them with PDS through RBKs,” the CM said.

He said the government has been giving MSP even for crops that are not covered by the Centre.

The 55,620mt-capacity groundnut processing unit at Dharmavaram would help 15,000 groundnut farmers, Jagan Mohan Reddy said, adding that the ₹75 crore unit would become functional in nine months.

The four vegetable and fruit processing centres in Annamayya and Chittoor districts would help 2,414 farmers while the proposed tomato processing units in Satya Sai and Anantapur districts would support 3,588 farmers. Some 32 primary and 13 secondary processing units for millets are coming up. The 7,200mt capacity secondary millet processing unit in Vizianagaram district will help millet farmers, he said.

In Kurnool, collector Dr G. Srijana informed the Chief Minister that the food processing society plans to increase the number of units to 5,000 by the year-end, thereby enhancing economic opportunities for more women in the region.

At Sri City, Koneti Adimulam MLA Satyavedu, collector Venkataramana Reddy, founder managing director for Sri City Ravindra Sannareddy and a host of invitees from other industrial units were present at the Mondelez premises.

Ravindra Sannareddy said, “On behalf of the Sri City industrial fraternity, I express my heartfelt appreciation and use this opportunity to welcome CM Jagan to Sri City in future for the opening of new units nearing completion.”