The Centre has convened a meeting of state food ministers to be held in the national capital on Saturday. The daylong meeting will be aimed at enabling coordinated action, and containing prices of essential food items.
It will be chaired by minister of consumer affairs, food and public distribution Ram Vilas Paswan and will be addressed by Union agriculture minister Radha Mohan Singh and minister of state (independent charge) for commerce and industry Nirmala Sitharaman. Senior officials of various Central ministries and departments including consumer affairs, food, agriculture, commerce and health & family welfare, and industry & commerce will also participate in the meeting.
High on the agenda of the meeting will be discussion on measures required to check unreasonable increase in prices of some food items, especially, pulses, edible oils and sugar. An action plan in this regard will be discussed during the meeting which will include strengthening the price monitoring mechanism, coordinated strategy to check hoarding and improve supply chain and use of Price Stabilisation Fund to ensure easy availability of these commodities.
Review of the implementation of the National Food Security Act (NFSA), adherence to online allocation to all fair price shops, coverage of more ration shops with biometric devices and strengthening redressal system will also be deliberated upon during the meeting.
Besides this, expediting “online procurement” which includes registering farmers’ details like mobile numbers, and account numbers for sending messages and making direct payment to farmers through system generated cheques.
Agriculture sector reforms for marketing farmers produce will also be one of the agenda items for the meeting.
