With a view to make financial assistance readily available for the small food processing entrepreneurs, FICCI has suggested the industry to come up with a dedicated bank in the lines of NABARD  Acting upon a suggestioncoming from the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI), the Indian food processing sector may soon have a dedicated bank in the lines of the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD). A FICCI survey report on the bottlenecks faced by the country’s food processing industry conducted on 250 companies carries this recommendation.
The report
In its report, FICCI has termed the Indian food processing industry as a ‘sunrise sector’, which is expected to witness immense growth in the years to come. Identifying the bright prospects ahead of the industry, FICCI has recommended that the food processing industry should come up with its own bank that will help in disbursing money to the small entrepreneurs in the sector.
“The big banks often dither in lending money to small companies. Therefore, it is very important that the food processing industry comes up with a bank like NABARD, which will be proactive in addressing the financial issues of the small food processing companies that cannot afford to approach big banks,” said Bidyut Baruah, regional manager of Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority.
Reason
Highlighting the reasons behind setting up of such a bank, Sameer Barde, assistant secretary general of FICCI said to a FoodProcessing360 correspondent that 70% of companies engaged in food processing are small and home-grown and lack adequate capital as well as infrastructural facilities required for competing with the big multi-national players.
“Therefore a dedicated bank committed to help the small entrepreneurs through financial assistance and business guidance will help them in coming up with better technology in manufacturing and packaging food products. This will assist them to compete with the big multi-national companies in the sector,” added Mr Barde.
Other recommendations
Among other recommendations, FICCI has promoted the concept of contract farming as a means to boost the growth of the industry. It has also suggested encouraging multi-brand retailing to invite global investment into the logistics and infrastructure domains.
Shalmoli Kundu |
