VELLORE: Local NGO Udavum Ullangal on Tuesday thanked Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa for announcing the ‘Amma Unavagam’(AU) facility in all the district headquarters hospitals and urged her to extend the facility to all the government hospital campuses. The NGO also suggested the launch of mobile AUs.
In a statement, president of the NGO R Chandrasekaran said, “I am glad that the Chief Minister has extended this facility to the district headquarters hospitals in a bid to widen access to low-cost but high-quality food.”
Chandrasekaran pointed out that the government eateries had attracted appreciation from administrations in foreign countries and within the country.
He said, the AUs should be established in all government hospitals and Primary Health Centres in the next phase of expansion.
Now that these government eateries have been established in different localities in the Corporations, the State government should consider introducing mobile vans carrying food items (Amma Unavagam on wheels) to sell them in crowded localities, and the vehicles could arrive at fixed timings. This model has been successfully implemented in Bangalore by some NGOs and entrepreneurs, he added.
Chandrasekaran said that the AUs could also introduce food items made of millets such as ragi, cholam, samai and varagu and other vegetables so that the people received quality nutritious food items. Traditional food items such as koozh, ragi balls, cholam roti (bakri) etc could also be served in the AUs.
This would not only help the consumers, but also motivate the farmers to switch over to cultivation of these traditional food crops, thus deviating from the mono culture of rice crop that required more water and inputs.