Bengaluru: The Indus Best Mega Food Park inaugurated by Union minister Narendra Tomar is beneficial in more ways than one. 

Firstly, it gives an impetus to the food processing sector's growth in Chhattisgarh. 

The park has been set up in 63.8 acres of land at a project cost of Rs 145.5 crore. The facilities created by the implementing agency at Central Processing Centre (CPC) of this Mega Food Park include cold storage - 3,745 MT, pack house - 10 MT/Hr, dry warehouse - 12,000 MT, boiler - 8 MT, aseptic pulping and packaging line - 6 MT/Hr for mango and 12MT for tomato, IQF and deep freeze 2MT/hr and 1500 MT, food testing lab besides state of the art enabling infrastructure.

Apart from these, the park also has three Primary Processing Centres (PPC) at Raipur, Bilaspur and Durg districts with facilities for primary processing and storage near the farms in the catchment area to benefit farmers. 

It should be noted that this food park will help the people of Raipur District as well as other districts of Chhattisgarh.

After inaugurating the park, Tomar underlined that it would ensure value addition, longer shelf life for farm produce, better price realization for farmers, excellent storage facility and will provide an alternate market for farmers in the region.

“The Park will also provide direct and indirect employment to about 5,000 persons and benefit about 25,000 farmers in the CPC and PPC catchment areas,” the ministry said in a statement.

The parks also give an impetus to the sector by adding value and reducing food wastage at each stage of the supply chain, focusing on perishables, the ministry of food processing industries is implementing the mega food park scheme in the country, notes Swarajya. 

They create modern infrastructure facilities for food processing along the value chain from farm to market with strong forward and backward linkages through a cluster-based approach. Under the scheme, the Government of India provides financial assistance up to Rs 50 crore per Mega Food Park project.