‘Farmers to be part of wheat procurement process’: Yogi govt’s novel step for farmers’ welfare

New Delhi: The Yogi government in Uttar Pradesh has always been alive to the welfare of farmers. The idea of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has been clear that the income of the farmers should be doubled and they should get the best price of their produce. It was achieved also as the record procurement of paddy and wheat in the last season had been testimony of this fact.

As a sequel to farmer friendly measures in the state, the Yogi government also put emphasis on having Farmers Producer Organisations (FPO) so that the farmers may themselves be the part of the various logistics related to farmers markets, procurement or pricing of their produce.

As another landmark decision, for the first time in the country, the UP government has decided to involve FPOs in the procurement of wheat, the process commenced on April one last. The state government has also issued a direction in this regard allowing FPO to participate in the procurement process and look after their interests for themselves. As the basic guidelines for FPOs, there should be at least 400 farmers members in each of the organisation and the registration

To start with, as many as 150 FPOs are engaged in the process which may have their own wheat purchase centers. Meanwhile, the wheat procurement has gained momentum in the state with a total of 14544 MT of wheat purchased at about 6000 centres with Minimum Support Price (MSP) of Rs 1975 per quintal.

The role of FPO is to act as an aggregator for member farmers including from inputs to output which will enhance the economy of scale and bargaining power of member farmers. The idea behind the FPO is to bring farmers, producer groups, traders and the department of agriculture and other allied departments of the state government on one platform.

Incidentally , Uttar Pradesh is the only state to have launched the UP FPO Shakti Portal as part of the Kisan Kalyan Mission. The portal, the first of its kind in the country, was developed by the department of agriculture with the support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) and aimed at benefiting the farmers at the grassroots level.

The Yogi government has set up purchase centres for the farmers within a 10-kilometer radius of their fields, so that farmers do not have to travel long distances to sell wheat. For the convenience of the farmers, the state government has decided that procurement will continue till the last farmers turns up to sell the produce.

It is to be noted that during the four-year tenure, the state government has made a record payment of Rs 29017.45 crore to more than 33 lakh wheat farmers. According to the official figures, the Yogi government purchased a total of 162.71 lakh MT wheat from 3345065 farmers during the last four years. The state government has made a record payment of a total of Rs 29017.71 crore to farmers for wheat purchased through a total of 24256 purchase centres in the state.