In order to facilitate the farmers and farming activities at field level during the lockdown period, the Department of Agriculture Cooperation and Farmers Welfare, Government of India is taking several measures. The upto date status is as follows:

• The Department has circulated the SOP related to crop harvesting & threshing during Kharif 2020 to the States to protect health of farmers and farm workers and to contain the spread of Corona Virus.
• The wheat producing States have reported 26-33% harvesting against the total sown area.
• During Rabi season 2020 NAFED has procured 1,07,814 MT Pulses (Gram: 1,06,170 MT) and Oilseeds (Mustard: 19.30 MT & Sunflower: 1,624.75 MT) on MSP totaling of Rs. 526.84 crore. This has benefitted 75,984 farmers.
• Advisory issued to State Governments/ UT to facilitate Direct Marketing, enabling direct purchase from the farmers/ FPOs/ Cooperatives etc. by Bulk Buyers/Big Retailers/Processors by limiting regulation under State APMC Act. The Department is closely monitoring the functioning of fruits and vegetable markets and on inter-State movement of agricultural produce.

• Module of uberisation of logistics aggregator has been recently launched on e-NAM Platform. More than 7.76 lakh trucks and 1.92 lakh transporters are already linked to this module.

• Railways introduced 62 routes for running 109 time table parcel trains to supply essential commodities including perishable horticultural produce, seeds, milk and dairy products at fast speed which will facilitate farmers/FPOs/traders and companies for continuity of supply chain across the country.

• Under the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN) Scheme during the lockdown period from 24.3.2020, about 7.77 crore farmer families have been benefitted and an amount of Rs. 15,531 crore has been released so far.

• National Horticulture Board (NHB) has extended the validity of star-rated certificate of nurseries to 30^th September, 2020 whose validity was expiring on 30^th June, 2020.
• India had a good crop of wheat, in surplus of its own demand. On specific demand from countries, NAFED has been asked to export 50,000 MT wheat to Afghanistan and 40,000 MT wheat to Lebanon under G2G arrangement.

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