KOCHI: Giving a shot in the arm to the vegetable and fruit preservation sector, five integrated pack houses with pre-cooling, cooling and ripening facilities will come up in the state within two years. These pack houses will be set up by Vegetable and Fruit Promotion Council Keralam (VFPCK) with the funding from Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA), and it will be set up in Palakkad (2) and Kannur(1), Wayanad(1) and Thrissur(1) districts.
The total project cost is pegged at `17.5 crore, and 50 cents to one acre of land is required to construct these pack houses.
Describing the initiative as one of the mega projects envisaged by the state, Agriculture Minister K P Mohanan said that these pack houses will be a great leap in achieving food security in the state.
“Farmers and exporters can store the produce at these pack houses. These houses will have the latest technology available to preserve vegetables and fruits. Though, there has been many efforts to start cold storage chains in the state, an integrated storage mechanism is something new,” Minister told ‘Express.’
VFPCK will submit a draft plan for the project to APEDA in the first week of July. The cost to build a pack house will hover around `3.5 crore. While APEDA will provide 90 per cent subsidy, the rest will be incurred by the VFPCK, and the land cost will be converted to the remaining 10 per cent of the required investment. At present, cold storage facilities are in place in Munnar, Vazhakkulam and Thiruvananthapuram, and plans are in the the pipeline to open more such facilities across Kerala. “It is estimated that around 30 per cent of the agriculture produce is being wasted due to lack of efficient storage mechanisms.
“The burden of such wastage is even more on Kerala since it is a consumer state. With the realisation of these pack houses, local farmers and exporters will be benefited in a big way,” said VFPCK Chief Executive Officer S Sivaprasad. He said that plans are also afoot to open the first pack house with in a span of one year. Shivdas B Menon, Managing Director, Sterling Group of Companies and an agriculture expert, said that lack of cold storage facility is the greatest challenge faced by the agriculture sector not only in the state but across the country.
“Cold storage facilities, either by the government or by private parties, is the need of the hour,” he said.