Government of India through CCS National Institute of Agricultural Marketing (NIAM), an autonomous organization of Department of Agriculture, Cooperation & Farmers’ Welfare, has carried out the assessment of the National Agriculture Market (e-NAM) scheme, with report titled Performance Evaluation of e-National Agriculture Market” (October, 2020). It was mentioned in the report that as on 14th May, 2020, farmers have transacted over Rs 1 Lakh crore on the e-NAM platform with a trade volume of 3.43 crore tones of commodities and 38.16 Lakh bamboo and coconuts. Further, as per the report, significant number of farmers opined prompt payment of sales proceeds through e-NAM.
e-NAM transactions can be settled through different available modes of payment outside e-NAM such as through cash payment, cheque payment, Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS)/ National Electronic Funds Transfer (NEFT), Debit Card, Internet Banking etc. in addition to that through e-payment facility available through e-NAM. While e-payment facility in e-NAM enables sale proceeds in e-NAM to be directly transferred from buyers account to the bank account of the farmers in a transparent, speedy and safe manner, it is not mandatory. So far, Rs 1047 crore has been paid through e-payment facility in e-NAM.
Following are some of the major steps taken by the Government to strengthen the e-NAM platform to improve farmers’ income:-
- Integration of additional 415 mandis with e-NAM, taking the total number of mandis to 1000 across 18 states and 3 UTs, thus bringing more markets access to farmers to sell their agriculture produce.
- FPO trading module has been launched whereby FPOs can trade their produce from their collection center/ premise without bringing the produce to APMC.
- Warehouse based trading module is provided in e-NAM to facilitate trade from warehouses based on e-NWR
- Further the e-NAM platform is made inter operable with Rashtriya e Market Services Private Limited (ReMS) platform of Government of Karnataka which will facilitate famers of either platforms were can sell their produce in other platform thereby increasing their market access.
- GPS Based e-NAM Mandi Locator: Farmers / Sellers can locate their nearby e-NAM mandi using GPS based mandi locator feature through e-NAM mobile app. This will helps the farmers to easily locate and reach the selected mandis and sell their agri-produce.
- Integration with AGMARKNET platform: Farmer can access the prevailing commodity prices & arrival information of e-NAM mandi as well as non e-NAM mandi on e-NAM mobile app. prior to even going to the mandi.
- e-NAM portal is available in English and 11 Indian languages (Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Gujarati, Tamil, Telugu, Punjabi, Odiya, Dogri, Malayalam and Kannada) to facilitate farmers to use e-NAM in the language of their choice.
This information was given in a written reply by the Union Minister of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare Shri Narendra Singh Tomar in Lok Sabha today.
****
APS