On January 5, 2020, the Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA) announced that eight states namely Maharashtra, Kerala, Uttar Pradesh, Nagaland, Assam, Tamil Nadu, Punjab and Karnataka finalised their action plan to boost agricultural exports.

Highlights

The Agricultural Export Policy was introduced in December 2018. The policy aimed at doubling agricultural exports from 30 billion USD to 60 billion USD by 2022. The APEDA nodal officers visited the product clusters at various cities in order to check if the policy implementation and their plan is effective. The product clusters selected were at Jalandhar (Potato), Sangli (Grapes), Salem (Poultry products), Theni (Banana). Chittoor (Mango) and several other places.

Also, the states are operating a market intelligence cell under the guidance of APEDA that report the activity of e-market intelligence, international trade issues and also about the current scenario of exporters and statistical information.

The National Cooperative Development Corporation have signed MoUs with the APEDA to include co-operatives in implementing the Agricultural Export Policy. Over 800 Farmer Producer Organizations have signed the agreement so far.

Need

In 2016, India’s share in global agricultural exports was merely 2.2%. Also, the policy aims at addressing issues like poor infrastructure, low farm productivity and global price volatility which are the need of the moment.