Government is to change its approach in States where horticulture and tourism are the main economic activities. This re-look of policy is expected to positively affect millions of families who are in food processing and tourism industry. The secretary of Food Processing Industries Ministry, Shri P.I. Suvrathan was addressing the Editors Conference on Social Infrastructure Issues in Srinagar today. Talking about the importance of maintaining hygiene while selling food by street vendors, he said the Government intends to introduce about 10,000 steel carts for street vendors in the main tourist places across the country. He said each steel cart will contain all facilities to provide hygienic food to people like a cooking gas range, facilities to dispose of used water, disposable items etc. Each steel cart would cost at about Rs.20,000/- . Mr. Suvrathan said in the next two to three years about 50,000/- to 60,000/- steel carts would be placed in the main cities and tourist places across the country.
The Food Processing Industries Secretary also stated that each city would have one food street which would provide a variety of ethnic food to consumers. He said the three food parks in Jammu and Kashmir are doing well and continuous interaction is needed with producers and consumers for the success of these parks. State Government agencies are to be activated so as to make these parks and other ventures like these profitable and successful.
Interacting with the national and regional editors, Mr. Suvrathan has said that the Centre is laying more emphasis on quality of food products by giving much importance on setting up of food labs. He said government is shifting emphasis towards imposing financial penalties for violators of food law like western countries. He said there will be only one integrated food law in the country instead of several. The Secretary said that there are 13 food laws in the country and these will be integrated into one single law and this would avoid piling of cases in courts.
The second area of thrust, the Secretary said is laying down standards on every single item. This would, he said, enable to trace the violator of the standard. Mr. Suvrathan said the Jammu and Kashmir University has been approached to set up a World class laboratory with global standard equipments. Young women and men would be trained so that the equipment would be handled by them efficiently. They would also be trained in various food processing jobs to build capacity. He also stressed the need for public private partnership in food processing industry in Jammu and Kashmir. The infrastructure bottlenecks would be rectified by this public and private partnership.
The two day Conference was inaugurated yesterday by the Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir, Shri Ghulam Nabi Azad. The Union Rural Development Minister, Dr. Raghuvansh Prasad Singh also addressed the editors. Director General, Press Information Bureau, Smt. Deepak Sandhu gave the welcome address.
PVR/NT
(Release ID :18519)