MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE (SHRI KANTI LAL BHURIA)
(a)&(b): The Government of Kerala offered to make available 200 hectares of land either in
Palakkad or Idukki district for setting up of National Institute of Organic Farming .
However, the National Bio-fertilizer Development Centre, Ghaziabad and its six
Regional Centres at Hisar, Jabalpur, Nagpur, Bhubaneswar, Bangalore and Imphal have been
converted into National Centre of Organic Farming and Regional Centres of Organic Farming.
The Regional Centre of Organic Farming, Bangalore is working for promotion of organic
farming in all Southern States including Kerala.
(c)&(d): No proposal has been received from the State of Kerala for setting up of a Regional
Institute of Organic Farming.
(e)&(f): The Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Agency (APEDA),
Ministry of Commerce & Industry have taken the following initiatives for development and
export of Organic Products from India:-
(i) The Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA) has
accredited 11 Certification Agencies for certifying organic products.
(ii) APEDA has taken up the issue of establishing equivalency of Indian Organic Standards with
European Commission and USDA.
(iii) APEDA organizes awareness programmes for development of organic farming for export.
This has led to increase in the certified area under organic production.
(iv) APEDA organizes training programmes for the domestic certification agencies to accredit
and make them at par with international certification agencies. As a result, 5 domestic
certification agencies have been accredited by APEDA.
