North East Mega Food Park, Assam’s newest Mega Food Park, went on stream on Thursday with the inauguration of its Central Processing Centre by Tarun Gogoi, chief minister, Assam; and Harsimrat Kaur Badal, Union minister for food processing industries. Minister of state for home Kiren Rijiju was present on the occasion.
The park has been set up in 50 acre of land at the cost of Rs 76 crore. The project is having facilities of fully operational industrial sheds for SMEs, developed industrial plots for lease to food processing units, dry warehouse of 10,000 MT, cold storages of 3,000 MT, common effluent treatment plant, quality control labs and so on. The park also has a common administrative building for office and other uses by the entrepreneurs. Six PPCs are also proposed to be set up at Nagaon, Badarpur, Tinsukia, Barapani, Krishnai and Kajalgaon which will provide facilities for primary processing and storage near the farms.
Speaking on the occasion, Badal said, “Mega Food Park will leverage an additional investment of about Rs 250 crore in 30-35 food processing units in the park and generate a turnover of about Rs 450-500 crore annually. The park will also provide direct and indirect employment to 6,000 people and benefit about 25,000-30,000 farmers in the CPC and PPC catchment areas.”
Badal said that modern infrastructure for food processing created at the park will benefit the farmers, growers, processors and consumers of Assam and adjoining areas immensely and prove to be a big boost to the growth of the food processing sector in the state of Assam.
Rijiju said that the park shall go a long way in helping the farmers of the North East. He said that the NE region has great potential for food processing and the government has taken many steps to promote the food processing sector as well as organic farming in the region.
