BHUBANESWAR: Protesting the callous attitude of the state government to their plight, members of Odisha Cold Storage Association are on dharna here to draw the attention of the members of the Odisha Legislative Assembly.
“With no revival package forthcoming from the government to save the cold storages constructed under the State Potato Mission, we are left with no choice but go for agitation to save the units before going bust,” said president of the association Syam Pansari.
Of the 47 functional cold storages, 26 units came up after the mission was launched in 2015 to attain self-sufficiency in production of potato.
With a target to increase potato production from two lakh tonne to nearly 12 lakh tonne within three years time, the government proposed to create an additional storage capacity of seven lakh tonne by setting up 112 new cold storages in private sector. As the Potato Mission failed, the new cold stores that came up after 2015 are unable to utilise the storage capacity and as a result, incurring huge losses.
“Each of the cold stores was constructed with an investment of Rs 7 to Rs 8 crore. The promoters have eroded their capital base in the last 4 years due to huge capital investment, higher electricity tariff, transportation cost, underutilisation of storage capacity and lack of warehouse receipt finance,” said association general secretary Janardan Sahoo.
Submitting a memorandum to Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, the association made several demands including a revival package or waiver of outstanding term loan of the promoters.
As the cold storages are on the verge of closure, the promoters have requested the Chief Minister for his intervention to provide them relief by subsidising the power tariff and making institutional arrangements for storage of agricultural produces like cereals, pulses and forest produces like mohua flower for capacity utilisation.
Cold storages of northern, western and southern districts have the potential of storing forest produces mainly Mohua flower but due to application of excise conditions this has not been possible. They claim that some states have allowed usage of such cold storages for forest produce.
The promoters have to depend on neighbouring West Bengal to store their surplus produce of tuber. But the government is not allowing storage of outside potato and onion leading to losses, Sahoo said.